


Sort of a Date Thing

by DreamSmithAJK



Series: Faith and Buffy's Super-Happy-Ending-Bedtime-Story [2]
Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Adventure & Romance, F/F, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-13
Updated: 2014-07-13
Packaged: 2018-02-08 14:41:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 25,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1944978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DreamSmithAJK/pseuds/DreamSmithAJK
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>PAIRING: Buffy/Faith<br/>CONTENT: A slow-building romance, coupled with lots of character development, action, humor, and an attempt to tell a story of true love without taking any shortcuts.<br/>SUMMARY: A retelling of Buffy Season Three, from about mid-season on, with Faith and Buffy slowly deciding to act on the attraction that has been present since the moment they first met.<br/>Buffy continues to work against the plotting of Mayor Wilkins, but Faith's loyalty to the bad guy is causing problems for our golden-haired Slayer; ESPECIALLY when Faith keeps doing inexplicable things, like saving Buffy from certain death, and displaying depths that make it difficult to dismiss the girl as just another villain.</p><p>Special Thanks to my Patrons for their support and encouragement:<br/>Charles Jackson, David Helmink, Jeffrey Clemons, Dale, Ethan Barton, Brandon Young, Andy Rowell, Marcel, Michael Cronin, Jessamyn Howe, and Lauren Cash.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter One

10:49 PM  
Thursday  
April 8, 1999

Buffy couldn't help thinking that it was all a little too easy. Yes, she could be sneakier than most people, when she bothered to try, and yes, it was probably uncommon for a would-be intruder to gain access to the second floor of City Hall by leaping upwards and catching hold of the half-inch-wide window ledge, then pulling themselves up and forcing the window open. The tiny office inside hadn’t had any alarms protecting it; and once she’d gotten that far she had the run of the whole building. 

Not that there was any reason for there to be elaborate security; after all, this was _Sunnydale_ , the picture-perfect example of a peaceful, sleepy little town. 

Even so, as she exited the office and eased down the darkened hallway, there was an unmistakable sense of danger hovering over her. 

Because despite the sleepy, safe appearances, this was still, well, _Sunnydale._

She had been here before, in this very building, and the bad guys _knew_ she had. Therefore…. Well, she didn't know, exactly. It was just that it seemed strangely sloppy for Faith and Mayor Wilkins to have been so careless as to leave their headquarters unguarded like this.

Moving past closed doors and down dimly lit corridors, Buffy finally reached the rear stairwell. Unlike the wider, more impressive stairs that led up from the building’s front foyer, these were mainly intended for use in emergencies like fire, earthquake, or the semi-annual apocalypse. The Slayer pulled the heavy steel door open slowly, wary of traps or ambushes. There were none, and she frowned slightly as she stepped inside and let the door softly close behind her.

_Maybe the reason there's nobody guarding anything here is because there isn't anything here._ The thought didn't make her any happier, and her frown deepened as she headed up the bare concrete stairs. _There's no rule saying that Wilkins has to keep all his stuff here, his sacrificial daggers and urns of zombie dust or whatever, just because his ‘Mayor’ office is here. He might have it all at his house. Or in a cave, underground, like the Master lived in, or in the groundskeeper's shed at the golf course for all I know!_

Even worse was the possibility that there wasn't a cache of incriminating sorcery equipment to be found at all. That's what was so frustrating about the whole thing; she and Giles barely knew enough to know that they _were_ in danger. Vague warnings of an ‘Ascension’ from a now dead demon, and Faith’s inadvertent confirmation that the town would be destroyed on graduation day; even though they were armed with those scary tidbits, they had pretty much no idea at all concerning what form the danger would take. They needed more information, and the usual avenues of research were not producing anything useful.

Which was why Buffy was here tonight. Not that Giles knew where she was or what she was doing; he would have insisted on coming along, and it was just too dangerous for anyone other than a Slayer to venture into the enemy’s fortress… or their office building, in this case.

Another turning of the stairs, and the growl from above her would have warned her, if not for the fact that she'd already known the vampire was there, on the landing in front of the third-floor access door. She had felt it a moment before; a sudden intensification of the danger she'd felt pressing close ever since she had entered the building. When the vamp leapt down the final stretch of stairs at her, she simply crouched low, letting him pass overhead as she drew her weapon. He was fast, like they all were, rebounding from the wall, turning and attacking once more, all in a single, blurring movement. 

Of course, she was faster yet, and she proved it by slashing her knife –Faith's DragonKnife--, through his throat in a flicker-swift move that he barely had time to see, much less avoid. Dust, not blood, gouted from the wound, the mystical fire bound within the blade searing the undead flesh to powder even as it's uncanny edge cut through with ghastly ease. He staggered back, hand flying to the wound as he tried to scream in horror; or maybe it would have been a cry for help. Either way, it wasn't going to happen now, when he was missing his larynx. Deftly flipping the knife around to an overhand grip, Buffy plunged it down, into his heart. The last thing that registered on his face was confusion. He knew that only wood could kill him in that way, not the gleaming steel of a knife blade. That didn't keep him from dissolving into dust, though, and the Slayer smiled grimly as she continued up the steps, toward the door where he had been standing watch, the magical weapon still held ready in her hand.

_Okay, that makes me feel a_ little _better about this. I found a guard, I dusted a guard; must be something here worth guarding, right?_

Having used the knife that Faith had given her to dust him, though; that was an odd feeling. Somehow, Buffy didn’t think the fallen Slayer had planned on her gift being used against her own henchmen. It made Buffy uncomfortable, almost like she was betraying the other girl….

_Which is a crazy thing to think;_ she’s _the one doing all the betraying around here,_ Buffy thought to herself. _If she hadn’t decided to go all ‘dark side’ on me, we would already have had Wilkins taken care of._

She shook her head in irritation; this wasn’t the time to argue what-ifs. 

Twisting the handle of the door with care to avoid any sound, she pulled it open a few inches and peered out into the hallway. Here was the center of Sunnydale's government… such as it was. A small town didn't really need a lot of governing, regardless of the politician’s opinion on the matter. A couple of nooks with receptionist’s desks, storage space for records, a few meeting rooms for the various small committees to gather and argue over zoning regulations and noise ordinances, stuff like that. Oh, and there was also an office where a man well over a hundred years old spent his time plotting something which would soon render all the rest of it moot. 

The entire third floor was dark, with no one in sight; to all appearances completely deserted. Even so, something very faint reached her straining ears.

Vampires were, by their very nature, quiet creatures. They had no heartbeat, and no need to noisily push and pull air into and out of their lungs. When standing still, they were nearly impossible to hear. 

If they moved, though; well, that was different. Clothing rustled, carpet crushed softly beneath the weight of their shoes, even the faint swirl of air displaced by their body’s passage was enough to catch the ears of a Slayer who was paying attention.

Buffy was being _very_ attentive tonight.

The vampire who stepped into view at the far end of the hall had an easier time when it came to detecting her presence. She _did_ have a heartbeat, her body _did_ need to breathe. Even with the heavy door open just enough to peek through, enough sound must have leaked through for him to notice; he turned his head and looked straight at her.

_Okay then, the jig’s up (whatever that means), and I was getting tired of the cat-burglar thing anyway. I’m the Slayer; I don’t have to be sneaky unless I feel like it._

The thought barely had time to flicker through her mind before she was through the doorway and hurtling down the hall as fast as her driving legs could carry her. 

He flinched back a step as he realized what was coming for him, and for an instant she thought it would turn into a chase. He didn’t run, though. Instead, his hand darted inside his jacket, frantically reaching for something hidden there.

Buffy snarled silently as she charged forward.

_No. No way am I going to get shot_ again.

It had been a week now since Faith had put two bullets into her, and Buffy could feel the faintest of twinges in her leg even now. She remembered quite clearly how much it had hurt, and she had no intention of waiting for the vamp to pull out his gun and put her through that again. So when she reached the end of the hall, she didn’t waste time with coming to a stop in order to cut or stab him. Instead, the Slayer simply lowered her shoulder and plowed into her foe without slowing, without even breaking stride. Granted, Buffy was small, barely five feet tall and weighing just over a hundred pounds. Despite that, she was moving _fast,_ and when she hit the unprepared vampire, he felt it.

Anyone in the building felt it, actually, since her body struck him with enough force to lift the demon off of the floor and drive him into the wall.

Not ‘against’ the wall; literally _into_ it. He might not have needed to breathe, but his agonized grunt testified to the pain he felt as the entire hallway shook in response to the impact. Buffy dropped lightly to her feet, finding her stance while the vampire recovered enough to realize his predicament. Half-lodged in the wall as he was, it was difficult for him to look threatening. He gave it his best try, though, the yellow-eyed stare, gleaming fangs, furrowed forehead; the whole deal. Buffy, unimpressed, merely raised one eyebrow and waited for his move. One hand still groping for something inside his jacket, the vampire erupted out of the man-shaped impression he’d made in the paneling and plaster. With a snarl he lunged at her—and met the blade of her knife as it punched neatly through his suit jacket, his ribs, and into his unbeating heart.

_\--Woomf—beep—_

Buffy took a step back to avoid breathing the dust as the demon imploded.

_‘Woomf—BEEP’?!_ She thought, crinkling her nose in confusion. _The ‘woomf’ I hear all the time, when they go all dusty; it’s the ‘beep’part that’s not the usual…._

She paused in mid-thought, her attention drawn to the vamp’s powdery remains. Usually all their personal effects, including clothing, were consumed as they died. Not always, though; sometimes metallic or plastic items survived, and this was one of those times. A small cellular phone lay on the floor, the digital display flickering. Buffy took a quick glance up both arms of the corridor intersection where she stood, making sure the coast was still clear, then she bent down and peered at the numbers there.

_This is what he was reaching for while I was coming to kill him? What did he think he was going to do, get a telemarketer to talk me to death? Leave a message with his girlfriend? “Sorry, honey, but I’m going to be late getting back to the crypt tonight. The Slayer’s here, you see, and what with me being an undead fiend and all, I think she’s going to dust me in about a second and a half—“_ The phone finished connecting; she heard it ring once, then it picked up… to silence. Not an open connection, no one was on the other end. This was the dead air you got when someone’s answering service picked up. Either that… or someone’s pager. Buffy straightened.

_Hm. Now who would a vampire have on his speed dial? Or maybe the question should be, who would he think would be able to help him against me? Who had him so scared that he would obey their orders even if it meant delaying long enough for me to get my hands on him?_

With a grim look in her eyes, the Slayer crushed the device beneath her heel. After that, it was only a matter of turning her head in order to locate her goal.

There, just to one side of the vampire-shaped divot in the wall, was the door to the Mayor’s office. Inside that room she might well find some clues about just what his plans were for Sunnydale come graduation. If she were truly lucky, she might even discover the means to ending those plans for good. Now that the guards were taken care of, all that remained was for her to get in there and start looking. Since the little scuffle with the second vampire had made enough noise to wake the dead, there wasn’t much point in being stealthy about it. Knife still held ready in her right hand, she raised her left, took hold of the heavy door latch, then twisted and pulled in one motion.

This door _was_ locked; not that it made any difference. Metal and wood screamed as she wrenched it open, and she couldn’t help a little grin at how easily this final obstacle gave way before her. 

_So much for the big, bad Mayor trying to keep me out of his headquarters. Now all I need to do is find whatever box of nasty toys he has in here, take ‘em to Giles and Willow, and all of this will be wrapped up in time for me to catch Letterman tonight—_

She’d taken only three steps inside before she realized the room wasn’t completely dark. A small desk lamp cast a dim light, enough to reveal shapes to even a human’s eyes. For a Slayer, it was enough to see everything with perfect clarity, including the man who sat behind that desk.

“Well, now,” He said from where he leaned back in his chair, to all appearances completely at ease. “I suppose I should say something about your not having an appointment, or maybe something about entering a room without knocking first—“ He sat up straight, and for a moment a trick of light cast his face into total darkness, with only his bright eyes and his broad, chilling grin shining out at her. “But the truth of the matter, Miss Summers, is that I’ve been wanting to meet you for quite some time.” He graciously waved Buffy into the room, and behind her the splintered door slammed shut with such force that for the second time in just minutes the building shook; this time to its very foundations.

  
* * * * *  



	2. Chapter Two

11:14 PM  
Monday  
February 19, 2001

Faith paused in the telling of the story, forcing herself to swallow past the sudden lump in her throat. In her lap, Kira stirred slightly, looking up in puzzlement.

“What’s wrong?” the child asked, her eyes touched with concern.

The young woman just shook her head in reply, still trying to gather her thoughts, distracted somewhat by the uncomfortable churning in her stomach.

_Wow; I wasn’t expecting this kind of reaction._ Her body’s response to where the story had led was something she’d experienced before; elevated heartbeat, eyes dilating to gather in every bit of available light, every muscle in her body was tensed, tingling in anticipation of combat.

And at the same time, she felt like she was on the brink of tears.

_There’s nobody here to fight; I’m way too late to protect him from her._ Mayor Wilkins and Buffy had lived in the same town for years, had known each other as enemies for months, yet they had only met each other, what, three times? Once when they’d exchanged Willow for his magic Gavrok box, once in the high-school library the day before graduation, and then the battle during the ascension itself. Faith had only been present during the exchange; she hadn’t been there when it counted, when she could have made a real difference in how things had turned out. 

Now, even though it was nearly two years later, she was surprised by how much bitterness she felt towards the blonde Slayer for what had happened to her mentor.

_I’ve got the nastiest urge, to just say ‘And then, before Buffy could do a damned thing, before she could even go “Huh? What?”, the Mayor jumped out the window, landed on the ground outside, and pushed the handle down on one of those old-fashioned detonators. Buffy looked around at all the dynamite and wires strung around the walls of the office, and her eyes got real big and round right before everything exploded. Her friends, sleeping safe and sound at home in their beds, woke up when they heard the sounds; first the huge ‘ka-boom’, and then a few seconds later the pitter-patter of flash-fried Buffy-bits raining down on their roofs like scorched, blonde and gold snow. Mayor Wilkins grinned, dusted himself off, and then went to go find Faith and tell her the good news. The two of them got pizza to celebrate, and when graduation day came all of the other smug, pretty little children didn’t have their Slayer there to think for them, or fight for them, so they died, and the evil duo, demon-lord and dark Slayer, both lived happily ever after. The End.’_

Faith sighed, pushing that image from her mind with difficulty.

_No, I can’t tell it like that. Kira wouldn’t talk to me for a week, if I did._

She cleared her throat.

“Sorry,” Faith said to the little girl lying propped against her. “I think I might need a glass of water or something; all this talking….”

Kira nodded quickly, bouncing up off the bed in an instant.

“I’ll get it for you!” 

She ran into the tiny bathroom that connected to her bedroom, leaving Faith to lie there and stare at the ceiling.

_Happy ending story, remember._ Super _happy ending story._ She grimaced at the blank white expanse overhead, taking advantage of Kira’s momentary absence to stretch the arm the girl had been using as a pillow. _What I need to do here is forget about how I feel about Buffy now, forget all the crap that’s gone down since that night we fought on the roof of my apartment._ She closed her eyes, ignoring the sound of running water from the next room, and tried to put herself back in that earlier, simpler time. _Me and Buffy, on different sides of things, and still so much the same person. I fought her, I laughed at her, and threatened her… but I didn’t hate her back then. Not even close._

_And I know, as much as it messed with her head, as much as what I was out there doing just offended the shit out of her and her high and mighty notions of what being a Slayer was supposed to be, Buffy didn’t hate me either. There was something there, between the two of us, a tiny little spark that could have turned into something. That’s what got me thinking about this stupid story in the first place, the way I felt about her, back then. I just have to feel that, again, dream like I did, back then. Maybe if I tell it, I can put the last of that stupid romantic crap behind me. It’s about time I did, since there’s zero chance of anything like that happening now._

There was one other issue with going on with the story she was telling, and Faith took a deep breath, forcing her body to relax, breathing through the tightness in her chest that even the memory of her grief still brought.

_It’s not wrong, to put him in there; it’s not. Better to have him there, in this silly fairy tale, even face to face with her, and talking with her, than to pretend he never existed. I know it’s not really him, and I’m probably not remembering him like he really was, exactly...._ She opened her eyes, sad, and at the same time strangely at peace. _It isn’t much, I know. It’s still better than nothing._

Kira came back, walking carefully to avoid spilling the water she carried. Faith smiled, and took the little blue plastic cup from her, and sipped a little from it.

“Better?” the girl asked anxiously.

Faith nodded, setting the cup on the bedside table.

“Better.” She lay her arm back along the headboard, and Kira climbed back into her place, leaning back against the larger girl’s shoulder. Faith cleared her throat experimentally, then launched back into her tale.

The one with the (Super) happy ending. 

Maybe. 

Hopefully.

“So okay; Buffy’s trapped in there, not sure if the Mayor’s magic is just holding that door shut, or if maybe there’s some kind of barrier there too that’ll bounce her back if she tries ripping it open. She looks at him, not sure why he’s not already attacking her or something, and tries to decide what to do next….”

* * * * *


	3. Chapter 3

Buffy’s first impulse, of course, was to leap straight at the Mayor, planting her foot in his face with so much Slayer strength behind it that his head would be ripped off his shoulders and go flying through the window behind him.

Her second thought, strangely enough, was to turn around and run like hell itself was chasing her. Buffy didn’t get scared very often these days, but the way he just sat there, waiting patiently for her to decide what to do just seriously creeped her out. Some vamps and demons tried for that kind of ‘I’m so bad that it doesn’t matter _what_ you do’ vibe; pretty much all of them failed miserably. Wilkins, though, was the real thing; someone with genuine power, and with a lot of experience in using it. He really didn’t seem to be afraid of her at all.

_And I don’t know exactly what I can do to change his mind,_ Buffy thought, keeping all her attention on the man behind the desk. _If he were just another monster, I’d slay him and be done with it. Trouble is, he’s_ not _a monster; he’s a human being, and Slayers don’t kill humans._

She’s seen what happened when someone like her lost respect for human life; Faith had done an excellent job of showing her the consequences when murder became a casual thing, just another part of the job.

_So no; I just can’t kill the guy. Really, I haven’t even seen him_ do _anything bad. Sure, he’s up to something, and his goons were behind that thing with the band candy and the stolen babies. We stopped him, though, that time at least. So at best it’s what? Attempted murder? Planning something UberBad? Is that enough reason for me to put a stake in his heart?_ Obviously it wasn’t, which left her at something of a loss. _What option does that leave me? Beating him unconscious, tying him up and giving him to the Watcher’s Council to lock up someplace where he can’t hurt anybody?_

Yeah, that would work. Because the snooty Brits had done such a great job of handling Faith, hadn’t they? If a sixteen year old girl, Slayer or not, could escape them that easily, then Wilkins would be out of his cell and turning everyone in the place into dog food within an hour of his arrival in England.

“Well?” His expressive face could show either arrogant assurance or irritated impatience with equal ease, and right now it was doing the latter. “Young lady, if you’re going to go to the trouble of killing my people and breaking into my office, I have to assume that you had something important you wanted to say to me.”

Buffy felt herself relax just a little; banter was something she could do with any enemy, even if actually Slayage was looking to be in doubt.

“Actually, I didn’t expect to find you here this late on a Saturday night, Mr. Mayor. How many hours a day can running Sunnydale actually take, anyway?” She put her hands on her hips and cocked her head slightly. “I mean, other than coming up with all the lies and cover-ups it takes to keep people from realizing what this town is really like; that has to be a real chore even for a hardworking civil servant like yourself. And those ‘people’ of yours that I killed tonight weren’t people, so much as they were demons, so don’t expect any sympathy from me.” She brightened then, looking at him hopefully. “Say, you don’t happen to be a demon, do you? One that just happens to look like a real person?”

Wilkins rose from his chair at that, and Buffy tensed in preparation for an attack, but he just folded his arms and gazed at her with those too-wise eyes.

“Gosh, it would make things a lot easier for you if I were, wouldn’t it?” He asked with exaggerated earnestness. The blonde girl gritted her teeth; there was nothing more annoying than understanding taken to the point where it became condescension. “It’s comforting, isn’t it? Living in a world that’s all black and white, us and them, good and evil.” He tilted his head to one side, imitating her own mannerism. “The problem, little girl, is that the world isn’t like that. One of the things you learn when you grow up is that things aren’t black and white; not if you bother to take a closer look.” His teeth flashed white in a sudden grin. “You know what? I think I can illustrate that in a way that even you can understand. How about this? Tomorrow, I’ll hire myself some human minions. Not many, just a few dimwitted thugs to help out with some of the simpler chores around here… like guarding this building.” He looked off into space for just a moment, rubbing his hands together as he thought, then those glittering eyes returned to her. “Yessir, that’ll be just the thing. I’ll make sure they have knives, and guns….” His expression darkened, and though his teeth still gleamed at her, he wasn’t exactly smiling anymore. “…And wives, and children. These men will have families, who will be so very, very sad if some heroic little girl finds it necessary to kill their husbands and daddies the next time she decides to breaks in here.” Buffy felt herself gaping at him, and he shook his head back and forth. “See? The world’s not so black and white, is it?”

She dropped her hands from her hips, a little surprised by the force of her loathing for the man.

“Okay; I’m convinced, you’re human. No demon could be that twisted.” He just looked back at her, not the least bit fazed by her hostility. “And you don’t need to bring any more humans into this anyway; you’ve already got one gun-toting, knife-swinging ‘minion’ working for you,” Her voice grew bitter. “I guess you’ll get a lot of chuckles out of me and Faith killing each other while you do… whatever it is you’re going to do on graduation day.”

_That_ got a reaction out of him. His eyes narrowed, he straightened slightly… and a shimmering ring of dim scarlet energy sprang into being at the edges of the room. It was rotating slowly, glowing so faintly that if the overhead lights had been on it would have been invisible.

“No one is going to kill Faith,” He said, his light, conversational tone at odds with the intensity of his gaze. “Not you, and not anyone else either.”

Buffy was still standing near the door, which put her entirely too close to the energy ring. It’s proximity was making her skin prickle unpleasantly, and she had the feeling that it would be a very bad thing to let it so much as brush against her.

Plus, she was getting a little tired of speaking to Wilkins from across the room; it made her look scared to get near him, which she wasn’t, so she walked forward, slowly.

“You don’t want me to kill her? Gee, then maybe you should stop sending her out to do your dirty work, huh?” She stopped when she stood just opposite him, the two of them separated by just the width of his desk. “That’s all she is to you, isn’t it? A ‘dimwitted thug’ like you were talking about a minute ago, somebody to throw at me so you don’t have to get your own hands dirty.”

The hands in question, his hands, were now in the pockets of his suit jacket. Mayor Wilkins considered her words for a moment, then abruptly turned and started around the desk towards her. Not quickly, though not slowly either; it was sort of a… stroll.

“A bit full of yourself, aren’t you, missy?” He asked, glancing over at her. Buffy backed off a few steps, but he stopped in front of his desk. “You think I would need Faith to take care of you?” Looking down at the floor before him, he extended one well-polished shoe and lightly tapped his toe there, just once. Instantly harsh white light flared; glowing runes shining through the carpeting, or perhaps they were woven into the material itself. Arcs and lines formed by tiny, closely-spaced mystic glyphs spread outwards, rapidly enclosing both Slayer and Sorcerer within an intricate diagram. “I know, you’re Chosen, that you wield a power most mortals could never truly comprehend—“ He gave her a level stare, his eyes catching the light from the glowing runes and seeming to look right through her. “—Unless, that is, they’ve been studying the Art for more than a mortal lifetime, until the decades add up to centuries. Someone like that would know more than a Slayer could ever hope to learn; even more than her _Watcher_ could ever hope to learn.” 

Buffy gave a little start at that. It had never occurred to her that while she and Giles had been studying up on the Mayor, their enemy would be studying up on _them._

Of course, he had someone to help him out with the inside info, didn’t he?

“Faith’s been talking, huh?” She asked. “I wouldn’t count on what she told you being much help; she was never able to understand the big words, even during the whole ten minutes she spent researching with us. Trust me, all she’s really good for is Slaying and jumping into bed with everything in sight; so don’t look for her to be a lot of help in organizing whatever evil empire you plan on building once you blow up the town.” 

Wilkins gave her an odd look.

“You know, it’s a little strange how you go from defending Faith to attacking her. You accuse me of using her, then you admit that you and your friends were using her long before she and I ever met.” The mocking, exaggerated manner then returned just as abruptly as it had vanished. “I think that’s darned hypocritical behavior for someone who’s the champion of all mankind, don’t you?”

Buffy’s mouth was open, all set for a truly scathing comeback….

_Um…._

It wasn’t that he was _right_ about how she and the others had treated Faith, and thought of Faith. Not exactly. She just needed a second to put together her rebuttal. He didn’t give her enough time, though.

“I didn’t need Faith to tell me about you, Miss Summers. I keep a close eye on happenings in my town, especially where individuals like yourself are concerned. The sudden arrival of Mr. Giles two years ago was enough to pique my interest; any serious practitioner of the occult knows something of Slayer lore. I checked up on things, found out who the current ‘chosen one’ was, and sure enough, there was your mother’s name on a brand new deed for a house here in Sunnydale.” She didn’t look away from him, even though the slowly spinning energy ring seemed just a little smaller, a little closer than it had been before. “I knew all about you, Buffy Summers, before your furniture was off the moving van. On your first day at your new school I was already arranging the details of your death.”

Buffy frowned, finding it hard to believe that he had been aware of her for all this time.

“Must not have been a good plan; in case you haven’t noticed, I’m still here.”

He nodded agreeably.

“Yes, you are. Because that night you met Darla, and Luke.” He perched his hip on the edge of his desk, watching her reaction to his words with interest. “The Master, you see, was a problem I’d been wrestling with for a long time. He showed up here just after the second world war, and he was powerful; difficult for even my spells to affect. He wanted to open the Hellmouth, to bring through a horde of demons that would have caused unbelievable destruction. I don’t want that.” The Slayer gave him a doubtful look, and he shrugged. “Believe what you like, it doesn’t matter to me in the least. Anyway, the best I’d been able to do was trap him, prevent him from carrying through on his plans. He was still down there, though, and there didn’t seem to be a way to dispose of him… until you arrived.” 

Buffy spent a few seconds wrestling with the idea that her actions in Slaying the ancient vampire had actually benefited the evil man standing across from her.

“So, I got rid of the nasty bat-faced boogie man, and….”

“…And I changed my mind about killing you, yes.” He looked thoughtful then, even as he raised his eyes to the ceiling overhead. Buffy followed his gaze, watching as more runes flared to sudden life there, the blazing symbols spreading outwards to quickly cover nearly the entire surface, mirroring those on the floor.

_Yikes. Maybe I should tackle him now, before this goes any further? Or at least see if I can pry that door open against whatever spell is holding it closed. If I try and fight him, though, who knows what’ll happen? Angel said that he heals super-fast; the only way to stop him from blasting me might be to rip him into little enough pieces that he can’t recover._

Faith’s promise came back to her; words that had seldom been far from her thoughts since they had been spoken a week earlier. _‘You kill mine, and I’ll kill yours.’_ If Buffy killed Richard Wilkins, assuming she _could_ kill him, then the other girl would hunt down and murder Giles. The blonde Slayer had no doubt that Faith really would try to carry through on her threat… and there was an excellent chance that she would succeed. 

“It’s a good thing I did let you live, too,” The Mayor said, breaking into her thoughts and making her look up at him once more. “Your boyfriend, Angel, and those others; if they’d managed to suck the entire world into hell like they wanted,” he shrugged again, a disarming smile briefly tugging at the corners of his mouth. “Well, that wouldn’t have done any of us any good, would it?” The smile vanished, and his face lost all trace of playfulness and humor. “You’ve done your work very well here. Your patrols keep the vampire population in check, your Slaying eliminates most of the random demons attracted by the Hellmouth… all of which makes my life simpler, for the most part, than it was before you arrived. You’ve helped people, you’ve been brave, and strong, and all the rest of it. However, what you fail to understand is that you will _not_ be allowed to interfere with my plans.”

Buffy smirked, and she put all the mockery she could into her voice.

“Well, _Dick,_ I—“ 

“Will _not,_ I said,” He continued, overriding an insult she’d been wanting to use for weeks now. “You are a child. You can’t conceive of a century, can you? A century of struggle, of study and dedication, of pain, and sacrifice—“ He broke character for a bare instant, chucking to himself “And sacrifices.” Back to utter seriousness, so quick it made her a little dizzy just watching it. “After all of that, don’t think for a moment that I’ll allow even a Slayer to interfere with my plans, even if she has made herself useful to me by keeping the worst of the riff-raff out my town.”

She was angry now, angry like she’d not been until that very moment.

“What is this? You were okay with me fighting all the _other_ fiends that tried to wipe the place out, and then when it’s your turn I’m supposed to just stand back and let you do it?” 

He considered that for a moment, then nodded in agreement.

“That’s about right.” He met her glare without any evidence of guilt or discomfort; not that she’d expected him to show any. “There’s weeks to go yet, before the Ascension. Take your mother, take your friends, and go on a long vacation. My travel agent can get you a swell deal on a group package to somewhere nice and safe; Michigan, maybe.” He grinned that cheerful, disturbing grin of his. “I hear the sturgeon fishing up there is wonderful this time of year; you’ll have a grand ol’ time!”

Buffy shook her head in disgust.

“And all the while, you’ll be turning the town into some kind of nightmare from hell?” She paused, frowning. “Okay, into _more_ of a nightmare from hell than it is already? No way.” Something nagged at her, then, and it took only a moment of consideration before she realized what it was. “You know, Faith told me pretty much exactly the same thing last week; that I should just leave town with mom and the others and let you do whatever you’re going to do.”

He just looked at her.

“Faith is a smart girl; if I were you I would listen to her.”

Buffy took a step towards him, her anger overriding her caution.

“No chance of that happening, Mr. Mayor sir; especially when you’re feeding her lines to use on me.”

His eyebrows shot upwards, the look of surprise on his face so total it was almost comical.

“You think _she_ got that from _me?_ ” He seemed on the edge of laughing hysterically, which only made the Slayer more furious.

“I’m that funny, huh?” she growled, taking a second step towards him. “I’m thinking you won’t be laughing in a minute. Just because you heal fast doesn’t mean I can’t fold you up like a towel and stuff you in that filing cabinet over there. We’ll install you in the ‘Ancient History’ section of the card catalog back at the library, and see how funny you think _that—_ “

His eyes lost all trace of amusement, and a second ring of luminous energy snapped into existence, this one a sickly green color, rotating at right angles to the first. It’s size and positioning should have put most of its circumference beyond the ceiling and floor, yet somehow it didn’t. All the magical forces now in play seemed to be distorting space inside the room, confusing her perceptions despite her more-than-human abilities.

Or maybe she was seeing the distortions _because_ of those abilities, because in certain situations she _could_ perceive more than just the mundane world. One thing was obvious to her, though. The new ring was slightly smaller than the first, and like the previous one it was centered not on the middle of the room but instead on Buffy herself. She glared at the Mayor, stalking forward another pace, nearly halfway to him now—

The sorcerer folded his arms across his chest, regarded her impassively… and another ring blinked into view, this one a deep violet, so intense that it hurt the eye. It spun rapidly, just barely beyond arm’s reach of the Slayer. Buffy froze in place, now the focal point of a very impressive gathering of mystical energy. Within moments, the other two rings had contracted, passing through various bits of office furnishings –and the Mayor himself—with no visible effect, until she was tightly surrounded by them, all three spinning and glowing and basically looking just amazingly menacing. She licked at lips suddenly gone dry.

_I, uh, feel sort of like I’m in a really big set of cross-hairs, here. Maybe I shouldn’t have mentioned the part about stuffing him in the filing cabinet until I actually had him in the filing cabinet._

It was also possible that coming here in the first place had been something of a bad idea, at least the part about coming alone. Giles and Willow working together might at least have been able to slow down the Mayor’s spell trap thingie long enough for her to get her hands on him. It was too late to worry about might-have-beens, though. What mattered at this point was—

“—What happens now?” She stood straight and tall, refusing to cringe no matter how bad things might be looking at the moment. “You going to kill me now, Dick?”

_There. At least I got that in before I got disintegrated, or shrunk down to be a dust mite, or whatever he’s going to do to me._

Wilkins watched her, still leaning back against his desk.

“I could. Killing you now would be as easy as snapping my fingers.” He raised one hand, fingers poised, and Buffy tensed. Every muscle in her right arm and hand trembled in readiness, the DragonBlade she still held in her hand poised to fly at his heart. The magic in the weapon might just be enough to inflict mortal injury to the sorcerer, and if she was about to be killed anyway….

Except, the Mayor didn’t snap his fingers. Instead, he lowered his hand slightly, frowning at her in indecision. The unexpected reprieve, potentially brief as it was, stretched Buffy’s nerves dangerously close to the breaking point.

“…Well?” She demanded, her voice level and calm, though it trembling just the least bit with the strain of holding herself motionless instead of trying something. “If you _can_ kill me, and you _should_ kill me, then why don’t you go ahead and get it over with?” He made no move to answer, and she felt her throat tighten. _Giles, mom, Willow and Xander. I love you guys, I hope you’ll be okay if I don’t make it through this._ “C’mon, you, you….” _My God. I’m so freaked out right now I can’t even think of a good insult. How embarrassing is that?_ She raised the knife to her shoulder, not caring now if he saw it. She would bet her life that she could manage the throw before whatever death-dealing zap he unleashed could finish killing her. “If you’re waiting for me to beg, forget it,” she stated, still unwilling to make the first move, lest she be the one who ended his bizarre hesitation and ended up being ultimately responsible for her own death. His hand was still poised, mirroring her own ready pose, and _still_ he didn’t end it. “C’mon, you have all the magic, all those years and years of wisdom or whatever, and all I’ve got is this little knife,” she was taunting him now, ignoring the bead of sweat slowly rolling down one side of her face. “If you’re really so powerful and I’m just a little girl, then what’s stopping you?!”

Wilkins lifted his hand slightly, and the spinning rings brightened as if in anticipation of her destruction, but if the man had planned to answer her aloud then he never got the chance. At that moment the office door, the one being held shut by his magic, opened.

Although ‘opened’ was not the most accurate description of just what that door did. ‘Exploded’ was much closer to the mark, with bits and pieces of dark oak spraying the room as a large object smashed through the barrier like a wrecking ball.

An object that had two arms, two legs, and an unruly mane of dark brown hair. Both Buffy and the Mayor stared with wide eyes as the same flying leap which had carried Faith through the now shattered door sent her flying straight towards the both of them. When she touched down on the floor once more, her momentum was such that she skidded forwards across thick carpeting and polished wood alike, not coming to a halt until she stood between the two of them. 

_“Don’t!”_ she shouted, arms spread wide to shield… Buffy. The blonde Slayer stared in disbelief at the other girl’s back, the mystic knife still poised to throw at the Sorcerer. Faith had to have seen that knife, seen that it was ready to fly at the man she’d pledged herself to serve, and still she chose to defend not him, but his enemy, instead.

_Her_ enemy, by any sane person’s assessment.

“Don’t kill her, please,” Faith continued, in a more normal tone, though the note of pleading was utterly foreign to anything Buffy had ever heard from the other girl. Wilkins faced his protégé, and if he were upset by her seeming shift in loyalties he didn’t show it.

“I’ve not hurt a single hair on her head… yet.” He nodded towards where the blonde Slayer stood, still trapped within the glowing rings of his spell. “I’ve not forgotten our arrangement, Faith; I didn’t go looking for her. She’s the one who came in here looking for _me._ ” A shrug, and a palms-up gesture indicated his helplessness in the face of such circumstances. 

The younger girl shot a quick glance back over her shoulder, and her flushed face, panting breath, and tangled hair were barely-seen distractions; all Buffy really saw was the confusion and hurt in those dark eyes as they flickered briefly to the knife the Slayer still held.

“What the hell were you thinking, B?” She demanded. “Didn’t you hear me when I told you I would kill your librarian if you pulled this shit? What part of that little talk did you not understand?!”

Surprised by the odd sense of shame she felt, Buffy lowered the knife to her side.

“Hey! I did _not_ come here looking to play Ninja-Assassin!” A momentary pause ensued, while all three of them looked at the outfit she was wearing; a black one-piece bodysuit, plain black sneakers, even her socks were black. Somewhat self-consciously, she tugged at a sleeve, her voice dropping to an embarrassed mumble. “This isn’t a Ninja suit; it’s a cat-burglar suit.” Remembering then that _she_ was the one person in the room with some moral high-ground on which to stand, she raised her chin and looked her darker half in the eye. “The point is, I wasn’t attacking anybody. I was... scouting. Gathering information on the enemy, which is completely outside anything you and I talked about. It’s not my fault that _he_ —“ She pointed at Wilkins, careful not to touch the nearest energy ring. “—Was here when I came in looking for evidence.”

Faith frowned, and for the first time looked a bit uncertain. Buffy couldn’t help noticing that the other girl was still breathing heavily, though recovering with typical Slayer speed. 

_She must have sprinted all the way here from... where? And how did she know to come in the first place? I know He didn’t call her—duh._ The vamp in the hall, the one with the cell phone set to speed dial. 

“She really didn’t know you were here?” The girl asked, looking at the Mayor. He didn’t seem especially happy to lose his justification in killing the blonde Slayer (though since when did the bad guys need to justify doing whatever they wanted?), but he shook his head.

“No, I don’t think she did.” His expression remained thoroughly disapproving. “Your Buffy isn’t a casual killer. Just a petty thief, and something of a vandal; not much different than your run-of-the-mill hoodlum, really.”

Faith finally lowered her outstretched arms, taking a step closer to him and lowering her voice slightly.

“She didn’t hurt you?” He blinked, looking somewhat offended by the mere notion, and she pressed on. “And she didn’t find anything that’ll mess you up, with your… deal?”

He studied her for a long moment, then shook his head again.

“No, she hasn’t learned anything—except that it’s a _very_ bad idea to trespass on city property.”

The girl nodded, and gave a little relieved-sounding exhale of breath.

“Okay then. How about letting her go?”

Oddly enough, he didn’t look in the least surprised at the request, though Buffy herself felt mildly stunned at hearing it.

“You know she’ll try again; that sooner or later we’ll be in this same situation, with the same decision to make?” Wilkins asked.

Faith shrugged in reply.

“Maybe, maybe not. If it happens, though…. I’d rather it was later.” She sounded a little uncertain; as tough and determined as she was in any other situation, here Faith was very definitely _asking,_ not telling. “So… will you?”

He didn’t like it, and Buffy didn’t completely understand why in the world he didn’t just go ahead and extinguish the only real threat to his plans. He didn’t, though. Instead he reached out and gently plucked something from amid the tangles of his pet Slayer’s hair; a bit of debris from the shattered door.

“All right,” he said, in a softer voice than Buffy had yet heard him use. Just that, and the lights went out.

The magical lights, that is; the three spinning rings of deadly energy vanished in an instant, along with the harsh white glare from the rune-covered ceiling and floor both. All that left was the dim, thoroughly-mundane light from the desk lamp, and it took a moment for Buffy’s eyes to adjust to the change. Even as she tried to blink her vision back, something grabbed at her hand.

“C’mon, B; let’s go.”

The Mayor just stood there, watching as Faith dragged the older Slayer towards the hall, but something, some bit of stubbornness or stupidity made Buffy plant her feet.

“Maybe I’m not quite ready to go,” she said, ignoring the tugging at her arm. “I’m a citizen of this town, after all; I think I should be able to see where my… where my mother’s tax dollars are going.” She started across the room, heading for a tall, spacious-looking cabinet made of some dark wood. “Like, for instance, what’s in here?”

From behind her she could hear Faith cursing under her breath. It was the Mayor, though, who spoke up.

“You’re a feisty little minx, aren’t you?” He asked, seeming not entirely pleased with the observation. “Determined, too.”

Buffy felt a little of her usual cockiness return.

“What did you expect?”

His eyes narrowed fractionally, though his tone remained conversational.

“What I expect… is that eventually my Faith will end up killing you, and in a truly spectacular and inventive fashion.” The tugging at her hand eased for a moment, and Buffy felt the other girl’s hand come to rest on her shoulder though she didn’t turn to look at where Faith stood behind her. Whatever the Mayor saw on his henchwoman’s face made him sigh softly before adding “Though I suppose that will have to wait a while, yet.”

Unable to let it go at that, Buffy opened her mouth—only to be all but yanked off her feet as Faith dragged her bodily towards the empty doorway. Planting her feet did her no good this time; the younger girl’s greater size and weight let her drag the lighter Slayer along despite any strength advantage Buffy might have.

“Remember this, girl,” Wilkins called as they reached the edge of the room. “Next to Power, friendship and loyalty are the most important things in this world. Betrayal, no matter what excuse you dredge up to explain it, _always_ carries a heavy price.”

Buffy stared back at where he stood, silhouetted by the light of the lamp behind him, and she wondered at how Faith could be so stupid as to stay with someone who threatened his own people like that. And then she caught the glint of his eyes as he stared at them, and with a chill realized that he wasn’t looking at Faith as he spoke, he was looking at _her._

“Think about that, before you do anything you’ll regret later,” He said, softly, as Buffy was pulled out into the hall and he was lost to view.

* * * * *


	4. Chapter 4

Buffy wasn’t used to being manhandled like this, even by someone as strong as Faith. If Angel, for example, had tried something along these lines she would have decked him without hesitation, and yet, here she was; being dragged bodily through the corridors of City Hall, stumbling helplessly along as the younger girl’s longer legs set a brisk pace towards the front staircase. It shouldn’t have been happening, Buffy shouldn’t have been _allowing_ it to happen. If anything, the two of them should be squared off and trying their best to kill each other right now. 

It might still end up that way, too, despite the unexpected rescue Faith had provided. If Buffy didn’t get her hand back very soon, she was going to have to hit the other girl from behind to make her let go, and a cheap shot like that wasn’t the Slayer’s style.

Well, not usually, anyway.

“Faith,” she said, as calmly and earnestly as possible. “Faith, stop. I need to see what he’s got in that office. If you’re there, I don’t think he’ll do anything too nasty to stop me, and I can get what I need to end all this. It’s still not too—“

“No. And shut up.”

The girl never even glanced back. Down the stairs they went, and the hand clamped around Buffy’s wrist might as well have been a steel shackle for all the luck she was having in twisting free. Growling in frustration, she tried again.

“Let me go! I’m serious, if you don’t—“

They reached the bottom of the stairs with such abruptness that Buffy accidentally bit her tongue. The lobby was dark and deserted, and the slick marble floor offered little in the way of traction for Buffy to use as Faith moved even faster, dragging the blonde Slayer towards the front doors. One of the heavy, brass-bound panels hung from a single hinge, looking like it had been forcibly ripped half out of it’s frame. Obviously if the Mayor’s henchwoman had a key she hadn’t taken the time to use it on her way inside a few minutes earlier.

The younger girl ducked through the opening and out into the night, pulling the smaller Slayer after. Then, before Buffy had time to realize what was happening, Faith suddenly spun a half-circle, using her grip on the blonde’s wrist to sling her across the broad steps that fronted the building. The older girl’s feet briefly left the ground as she was bodily thrown twenty feet or so from where she’d been standing. Some wild, mid-air flailing got her properly oriented so that she came back down feet first, on balance and ready for a fight. Buffy whirled to face her opponent, bracing herself in case Faith was already charging at her.

She wasn’t. The renegade was standing in the doorway, looking set to bar her way if Buffy tried to go back inside.

The Slayer straightened slowly from her combat stance, wondering what was going to happen next.

“Okay, now what?” She asked. 

Faith was still tensed, ready to attack or defend in an instant, if need be.

“That’s up to you, I guess,” The dark-haired girl replied softly, her eyes intent. “Still lookin’ to tie me up and mail me off to England? Because I have to tell ya again, there’s no way I’m going to let that happen. Not while I’m still breathing, anyway.”

Buffy could hear the truth in that statement, and the desperate fear that lay beneath it, that Faith, for all her bravado, couldn’t quite hide. The other girl might not be afraid of dying, but she was terrified at the prospect of being locked away for the rest of her life in some gothic horror of a dungeon. Or, worse yet, being subjected to years or decades of whatever tests and experiments a gathering of eager Watchers would devise for a Slayer who had gone rogue, and therefore forfeited whatever meager rights they might have granted her otherwise.

“No, no Watchers,” Buffy assured her. “Whatever happens, we’ll keep it in the family.”

That elicited a snort of derision from Faith.

“Hey, the fam, great.” Bitterness practically dripped from the words. “Guess that makes me the crazy sister that everybody wishes would run away from home, huh?”

The blonde Slayer felt a familiar stab of irritation.

_Always the martyr, right Faith? It’s always you that’s being ignored, or treated badly; nothing that goes wrong for you is ever your fault, is it?_

“Whatever,” She snapped, not willing to get into that particular argument just then. “Be grateful that I’m not looking to bag you tonight. All you need to do is get out of my way--” She started forward, towards the entrance to the building. “—And once I get what I need from inside that office then you and Wilkins can play a nice game of Monopoly, or whatever the heck you evil types do when you’re not trying to sacrifice babies to snake demons.”

Faith folded her arms across her chest, not moving from her place in the doorway.

“No.”

Buffy drew up short of where the other girl stood, eyeing her curiously.

“What, you’re going to stand guard there all night, just to keep me out?” The blonde girl shook her head doubtfully. “I give it half an hour at most before you get bored and wander off; you know your attention span isn’t much even on a good day. And as soon as you’re gone I’ll be back inside and digging up the dirt on you and your boss’s plans for the grad-day shindig.”

Faith stared at her, incredulous.

“B, are you always this stupid nowadays, or is it only when you’re around me?” She hooked a thumb back over her shoulder, indicating the building that loomed over them both. “You were a couple of seconds away from dyin’ in there just now, or weren’t you awake for that part?”

Buffy shrugged. It was true, about the tough spot she’d been in; that didn’t mean she was about to show any signs of weakness or uncertainty in front of this particular enemy.

And Faith was still the enemy, even if her behavior lately had been strangely…. No, the point was, _enemy._

“He surprised me, with the whole magic circle trap thing he had set up. Now that I know about it, I won’t get caught that way again.” She smiled suddenly. “You’re really worried about me going in there, aren’t you? What’s the matter, afraid I’m going to find something that’ll put you and your boss out of business?”

The other girl stared at her in disbelief.

“No, what I’m _afraid_ of is that you’ll go back in there, and my boss, who isn’t exactly the world’s most forgiving guy, will decide to save himself some trouble later on and just go ahead and exterminate you!” She took a step towards the smaller Slayer, her eyes searching the other girl’s face. “Stop and think for a minute; do you want to do this because you really think it’s a good idea for you to walk into this place again tonight, or are you wanting to do it because you’re pissed that you screwed up so bad that you needed me, me especially, to come and save you?”

Buffy blinked.

“Ah, _no,_ that’s not it at all. Absolutely not… in any way is that a reason for anything.”

_And if that sounded a little defensive there’s a reason, darn it._

“Going back in there, even if it is dangerous, is just the kind of thing that a Slayer, a _real_ Slayer does.” Buffy added a little glare to go along with that, figuring that the best defense was a good offense, yadda yadda yadda. “It’s my duty. Not that I expect you to know anything about that.”

“Uh huh.” Faith didn’t seem convinced, though she didn’t push any further. “Well, if everything before was five by five and going exactly according to the secret, white-hat playbook, then I guess I didn’t really have to run all the way over here to haul your ass outta the fire, huh?”

The blonde Slayer gave a noncommittal sort of shrug.

“I….” _I hate this. She’s right; how did this all get turned around? Not only did Faith end up saving me; she’s also right about why I’m acting like this. I just don’t want to seem like wimpy helpless-victim-girl, not next to the original bad-ass, leather-chick herself._ She took a moment to really look at the girl standing across from her, and felt her eyebrows rise a fraction. _Even though she’s actually not wearing any leather at all just now._

In nothing but a white tank top and loose, comfy-looking jeans, Faith looked a lot less like a death-incarnate sex machine (or should that be ‘a sex-incarnate death-machine’?) and more like a normal, everyday teenage girl. In fact, unless Buffy’s eyes deceived her, the younger Slayer wasn’t even carrying any weapons. There was no sign of any knives, guns, swords; not so much as an old-fashioned stake.

_Amazing. She must have really been in a hurry to get over here if she didn’t even stop long enough to grab something lethal._

“I….” Deep breath, plunge ahead. “I suppose it’s a good thing you _did_ show up.” _There. That’s at least a nod in the direction of an actual ‘thank you’. Which is as much as she’s going to get from me. That whole ‘enemy’ thing, don’t forget. Still…._ “You’re kind of, um, underdressed—for nighttime in Sunnydale, I mean. Did I… interrupt you? I mean, were you in the middle of doing something?” Buffy asked. _Or possibly some_ one. Though the blonde Slayer wasn’t sure if she really wanted to know the details of Faith’s current sex life. _She was wild enough back when she thought she was a good guy. Now that she’s all about embracing her inner darkness, who knows_ what _she’s into._

Faith, though, was shaking her head.

“Nope, I was just hanging out at home, doin’ needlepoint and listening to old opera records.” A smart-ass smirk tugged at her full lips, and Buffy half-smiled in return.

“Ah. Sure you were. And doing it barefoot, I see.”

The other girl glanced down at her exposed toes, then looked back at Buffy.

“Yeah. ‘Cause you know, those boots aren’t actually bolted onto my feet or anything. They _do_ come off.”

The blonde girl nodded.

“I used to wonder.” 

_Um. The tone here just changed a little; whatever’s going to happen I guess we’re not going to fight after all._

And that thought made her realize that she still held Faith’s dragon knife in her hand, which was not a good thing unless she _was_ planning on initiating some bloodshed. 

_I had that the whole time she was dragging me outside, and she still left her back wide open. What if I had—_

Buffy shut down that line of thought. Stabbing Faith, actually killing her…. She took a deep breath, her stomach suddenly queasy.

 _All right, I suppose it_ might _come to that. Maybe. I told her before that if it came down to killing her to save the town, I would do it._ The younger Slayer stood there, watching as Buffy weighed the knife in her hands, saying nothing, showing nothing of what she was thinking. Feeling unaccustomedly clumsy under the other girl’s eyes, the Slayer fumbled the weapon back into the sheath she wore at the small of her back. 

_It won’t come to that. I won’t let it come to that, no matter what it takes._

That left the two of them just standing there, staring at each other, and the silence quickly grew uncomfortably long.

Looking for something, anything to say that didn’t involve that knife, or someone dying, Buffy gestured with her now empty hand.

“You, um, didn’t hurt your feet, running over here, did you?”

It must have been too obvious, or too artificial an attempt to lighten things up; the other girl’s dark eyes suddenly glittered with a mixture of cynicism and sullen anger that was all too familiar.

“Wow, concern; real convincing, too. And if somebody had just removed my brain I might almost believe you actually give a sh—“ Faith bit back the rest of what she had been about to say, visibly reining in her temper. Glancing away for a moment, she clenched and unclenched her fists, then started again. “No, I didn’t hurt my feet,” she said, speaking with exaggerated calm. “They’re good; I’m good.”

Buffy nodded again, feeling increasingly foolish.

“Oh. Good.”

Silence again, and this time neither one of them seemed to know how to break it. The Slayer turned her head and scanned the street, wondering if anybody driving by would notice the two of them facing off in front of City Hall, and think it strange. Although for Sunnydale, such a sight would barely make the measuring scale of ‘strange’. She looked back at the younger Slayer, noting how Faith had edged back a step or two, and was again planted squarely in the broken doorway, arms folded. She looked more firmly set than the walls of the structure itself, like it would take a small army and a large battering ram to budge her from that spot; which was likely the literal truth. 

For anyone else, anyway; because Buffy _could_ move her. She had the knife, after all, and Faith wasn’t even armed. If it came down to it, she could take the other girl; she might even manage to remove Faith from the equation without killing her, though it went without saying that she would put up one hellacious fight. Buffy would be forced to hurt the girl in order to make her surrender; she would probably have to hurt her very badly indeed. She could do that, though, and in the final analysis that’s what a Slayer _should_ do; fight the evil beings, kill them if necessary, in order to protect innocent lives.

Even as she thought it, though, Buffy knew with absolute certainly that she was not going to attack the other girl. Not here, not like this. 

Which made just about as much sense as the rest of it.

_What am I doing? What are_ we _doing? A month ago she betrayed me, kidnapped and nearly tortured me. Then last week we fight and kill a demon together, she shoots me, then gets her friend to patch me up. Now she saves me from her own boss, and is standing guard out here not to protect him, but to protect me from myself._

_What is wrong with the two of us? Can’t either of us just act like we’re supposed to act? She should be trying to burn down an orphanage or something, and I should be punching her silly for daring to try it. Bad guys lose, good guys win, end of story._

She frowned, folding her own arms in an unconscious mirroring of Faith’s pose.

_I think the Mayor was right; I_ do _want things to be simple, black and white, good and evil, and Faith isn’t playing her part right. She keeps switching back and forth from good guy to bad guy, and I can’t figure out which is the real her. She didn’t even bite my head off a minute ago when I asked about her feet, and I could tell that she wanted to. How am I supposed to act when she won’t even rant and rave at me like she should? Why does she have to tangle things up like this?_

A minute or two had now crawled by with neither of them moving, and finally Faith broke the silence with a sigh.

“So are you going to go home, or to the library, or something? Or are you just gonna stand there and stare at me all night?”

Buffy, still maintaining the aforementioned stare, took a moment to think it over.

_Good question; what_ am _I going to do? Fighting is out; I’m not going to go all postal on someone who just saved my life. That doesn’t mean that I’m just going to walk away and let her and her ‘Boss’ get along with their plans either._

The other girl was looking back at the blonde Slayer, showing more genuine self-assurance now than she ever had when she had been one of the good guys.

_She’s dead serious; she’s not going to let me back in there, which is a shame because there probably_ is _something clue-worthy in that office. The Mayor may be old, and powerful; he might even be as invincible as he thinks he is… but his scheme isn’t unstoppable. He wanted to kill me, up there; I saw it in his eyes. He’s afraid that I can do something, something that’ll unravel everything he’s working on. Otherwise why would he care_ what _I did?_

_So, the question is, why didn’t he go ahead and get rid of that pesky Slayer (That’s me; I can refer to myself in the third person if I want to) when he had the chance?_

The answer to that one was refreshingly simple.

_Because Faith asked him not to, that’s why._

The younger girl stood there, barefoot and wearing just the tee shirt and jeans, though if the chill night air was bothering her she gave no sign of it. Buffy was again struck by how young Faith looked just then; without the leather, weapons, and makeup to help her look older. Right here, right now, she seemed just a girl with an odd sort of beauty and an even more peculiar air of vulnerability lurking just beneath the surface.

She wasn’t just a girl, though. Either through predestination or mere happenstance, events had conspired to make her crucial to the fate of thousands.

_Whether or not she knows it, Faith is the key to all this. She’s half of the Mayor’s firepower all by herself; maybe enough to tilt the odds in his favor if it comes to some kind of full-on battle, his vamps and demons against my people. She cancels me, Slayer versus Slayer, and even if none of Wilkins’ vampires are as tough as Angel, he has a small horde of ‘em, and we only have the one. We know that his Mayorship deals with demons, too. A few of those would be a match for the rest of my gang (at the very least they would match the gang), which leaves Wilkins himself without anybody to stop him from killing us off one by one while we’re busy fighting for our lives._

_When you add it up, he’s the toughest thing I’ve ever fought; with the magic, the vampires and the demons all going for him, but Faith is his real strength, the one thing neither the Master or Angelus had._

_The thing is…she’s also his weakness; if not for her, I would be dead already, and the balance would be tilted even further towards his side of things.... Wilkins is smart, that’s for sure. He’s making a mistake, though, by letting her talk him into doing stupid things._

_Maybe I can use that. If I can just figure out_ how…..

Faith was still waiting, and Buffy decided to try a different approach. If being direct and confrontational didn’t work (and so far it hadn’t), then maybe something more friendly might.

“Actually, I was thinking about just staying here for awhile, and talking to you,” she said, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. “I’ve been looking for you all week, you know.”

An expression flickered briefly across Faith’s face at that, something that looked like unease, or maybe fear.

“You were… looking for me?” Her voice was uncertain, her eyes searching, until she suddenly nodded in comprehension. “The leg, huh?” That pale face smoothed into a coolly expectant mask. “Looking to deal out some payback, are we? I can relate to that.” She unfolded her arms and shifted her feet, bracing herself. “Come on, B; whenever you’re ready.”

Buffy smiled.

“No, no payback. If I owed you anything for that, I think tonight evened the score.”

The other girl stayed in her ready stance, though her face looked a little less certain than it had when she’d thought violence was imminent.

“Then what? If we’re not gonna rumble, what _do_ you want from me; fashion advice?”

The blonde would have laughed at that, if not for the two pairs of leather pants that had recently been added to her wardrobe. Not that she had been influenced by how good they looked on Faith or anything, it was only….

_They were on sale; and… leather is very durable, good for Slaying in, and, and... very sexy, too._

Buffy hoped the light out there in front of City Hall was dim enough to hide her blush.

“Like I need to get your input on which eyeliner goes best with my tattoo?” She replied, trying to cover her embarrassment. Faith’s eyes narrowed, and that habitual sneer pulled her lips back from those white, gleaming teeth. The Slayer winced internally.

_Wrong move, Buffy; she’s_ used _to being attacked and insulted, to people trying to tear her down. The only way to get to her is to do something different than she expects._

“I’m sorry,” She said, and she meant it. “I only….” Her hands had been making uncertain gestures as she tried to make the words come. With conscious effort she put them back at her sides. “It’s just that you seem… different. Lately.” 

_Some of the time, anyway,_ she added mentally.

Faith, though, appeared unmoved.

“Maybe you’re wrong. Maybe I was always this way, and you never bothered to notice.”

Buffy gave a half-nod, willing to admit to that much.

“You’re right, I should have talked to you more, gotten to know you better.” That came out sounding too apologetic, though, and she couldn’t resist adding: “Of course, when I _did_ try things your way, we ended up breaking and entering, wrecking a police car, and killing a man.”

Faith, who had been looking a little more relaxed, bristled instantly.

“Fuck you, Miss ‘Innocent bystander’! You were right there with me all the way, so don’t you _dare_ start all that shit about everything being my fault!”

Being shouted at didn’t help Buffy’s own self control any.

“Who wanted to steal weapons instead of going back for the ones we already had?” She shot back heatedly. “Who got us arrested? Who put two policemen in the hospital?”

And, of course, the next one would just have to be _‘Who rammed the stake into Allen Finch’s heart?’_

Those words, though, she managed to hold back, if only just barely.

_This is_ so _not how I need this to go,_ she thought desperately. _I need to find out things, things that only she knows. To do that, she has to talk to me, not scream at me._

Faith had both hands clenched into fists, like she expected to be using them any second now.

“You smug little bitch,” She snarled, her already throaty voice deepening even further. “You wrote me off as a psycho from the start, and we both know it. That first patrol, when I didn’t ‘help’ you fast enough, you decided that I wasn’t worth the fucking effort.” Fury had lowered her voice, but it was something else that twisted her mouth like she was tasting something vile. “The rest of it, all the times after that where you had to be around me, was just you pretending everything was okay. Maybe it made you feel better or something, even more noble and shit, to have ‘forgiven’ me for being such a head-case.” She glared at Buffy then, and her dark eyes were venomous with long-hoarded emotion. “I’ll bet deep inside you were even happy about how that little walk on the wild side ended up, weren’t you? You got a little taste of what my world’s like, and for a bonus you got to step back and be all moral and superior when things went bad. You were looking for that last bit of proof that I was a lost cause, and damn if I didn’t hand it to you, huh?”

Buffy was feeling a little disoriented by this glimpse into Faith’s worldview.

“Do you really believe that’s what I thought, what I think?” She asked. “How can you possibly--?”

“How can I _not_ think that, B?!” The girl snapped back at her. “Everything you did, practically every fucking look from you told me how you felt. It didn’t matter what you _said,_ it’s what you _did_ that mattered.” She finally dropped those darkly-burning eyes, looking past Buffy’s shoulder at the empty intersection beyond. “Not that you ever said much of anything to me anyway, ‘cept for telling me when it was time to go and kill something.” That last came in a husky whisper, like she hadn’t cared if the blonde Slayer heard her or not.

Buffy _had_ heard it, though, and realization came with an icy shock that passed through her entire body.

_Oh. My. God._

It wasn’t what Faith had said, that made the Slayer reel, it was the way she’d said it. The emotion, simple, unfeigned, the answer to so much of what had puzzled her about the younger girl’s actions. Buffy knew why she’d been rescued, knew why she hadn’t been shot dead a week earlier. Painfully obvious now, to be sure. Probably obvious to any objective observer. From where she stood, though, it hadn’t made sense at all…. 

Until now.

Faith, oblivious to the Slayer’s sudden revelation, was now withdrawing behind her mask of casual indifference.

“So, now that we’ve both shared and learned and grown, why don’t you get the hell out of here before I rip that stop sign out of the ground and use it to make you a little less pretty?”

“That’s just it, Faith,” Buffy replied, through lips still numb with shock. “We _are_ sharing. We’re talking.” She blinked, taking a breath to try and clear her head. The younger girl looked back at her curiously, unsure of where this was going. The Slayer spread her empty hands, and slowly walked forward.

“You’re wrong about a lot of things,” She started, her tone softening what might otherwise seem like an accusation. “I never wrote you off… well, okay, I guess when you had a scalpel at my throat I might have come close.” Ten feet between them now, and Faith was looking like she was caught between leaping forward and attacking or backing away to maintain a safe distance. “These things you’ve been doing lately, though; it’s like you’re trying to give me a reason to change my mind. Or maybe you’re trying to tell me something.” _Shouting it, really; I just didn’t want to hear. All this time, I just thought you were playing with me, ‘screwing’ with my head, is how you’d say it. You weren’t, though, were you? You were doing the one thing I’d never expect from you… being honest with me._

Five feet separated them. Easily close enough for a sudden attack. “You said I never really talked to you, that I never tried to understand who you really were. Fair enough.” Buffy paused, just within arm’s reach, and looked up into Faith’s eyes. “I want to talk now. I want to understand what you’re doing, why you’re fighting against everything I thought you beloved in.”

The taller girl shook her head, stubborn anger replacing some of her confusion.

“I’m _not_ going to turn on him. Not for you, not for any—“

“And I’m not asking you to,” Buffy said, overriding Faith’s words. “Not right now, anyway. All I’m asking is for you to explain why you’re with him, instead of me.” Deliberate choice of words, there, and she saw Faith’s dark eyes flicker as they registered. “I just want—“ She smiled; and it was easier than she’d thought it would be. “I just want you to talk to me. Can you do that?”

The other girl eyed her uncertainly.

“Yeah, I ‘spose.”

Buffy’s smile widened; the key here wasn’t to be more of a bad-ass than Faith, it was to come at her from a completely unexpected direction. “Then come on; let’s walk.” She took hold of Faith’s hand, tugging gently.

The taller girl didn’t budge.

“We can talk here just fine.”

The blonde kept pulling, lightly.

“Sure, we can. I just don’t feel like standing here where his Mayorness can leer down at us from his office window.”

That made Faith glance up, and even though there was no one visible at any of the windows, she didn’t resist when Buffy tugged just a fraction harder. They headed off down the sidewalk, the older Slayer leading the way.

“Where’re we going?” Faith asked, suspicion still coloring her voice.

Buffy shrugged.

“It doesn’t matter. We’ll know it when we get there.” She sounded calm, cheerful, even a little amused.

She was none of those things.

They crossed the street, and Buffy picked a direction at random. It was true, that the destination didn’t especially matter. What she was trying to figure out was what exactly she was going to say when they got there. When Faith came to a sudden stop, the smaller girl turned to see what the problem was.

“You know, B, I’m suddenly wonderin’ if you’re going to keep me busy so that the Scoobies can sneak in back there and finish what you started.” Faith watched her closely, looking for some sign that she’d guessed right. “That’s it, isn’t it?”

Buffy shook her head slowly, holding the other girl’s eyes with her own.

“No, Faith, that isn’t it. None of the others even knew I was doing anything tonight.”

A long moment of staring at each other, then Faith relaxed, nodding.

“Good. ‘Cause you know that even if they did get in there, the Mayor could gut them all inside of ten seconds, leave them stacked on your front porch, and never even get his suit dirty.”

The blonde Slayer made a face.

“Nice image. Now come on.”

Now it was Buffy who had her hand on Faith’s wrist, drawing her along as they walked through downtown.

“Okay then. So long as you know better than to try anything tricky.”

Buffy kept hold of the girl’s hand as they walked along, her grip gentle even though it would have taken a vice to do those fingers any damage.

“No tricks,” She lied, her smile never faltering.

* * * * * 


	5. Chapter 5

Buffy was thinking about love. 

Not that this was a new thing for her to be thinking about; after all, she was eighteen years old, with a darkly-handsome vampire boyfriend she’d been in love with for around two years now. Love was something she’d spent a lot of time thinking about, in one way or another.

_Just not in this exact way,_ the Slayer thought to herself.

She and Faith were walking along the southern edge of Sunnydale’s downtown district… which was all of about five square blocks. Sure, there were other clusters of businesses in the area, like the one that had grown up around the mall, but this was where most of the Slaying action took place. Well, here and in the various cemeteries. Any other time, if Buffy had been walking this street, at this time of night, she would have been on the alert for prowling vamps, lurking demons, or even the occasional, incredibly-foolhardy mugger.

Tonight, though, her thoughts left her all nearly oblivious to her surroundings.

_Am I wrong about this?_ She wondered, for the fifth time in as many minutes. _I might be reading this as something it’s not, or this could be another trick._ She wasn’t sure who she was trying to convince of that, or why she was so desperate to come up with an alternate explanation. 

_Just because Faith hasn’t killed me, or tried to tie me up and carve me into chunks like she wanted to do a while back, that’s no reason to think that she has… feelings for me. Feelings other than the good ol’ fashioned ones like hate and loathing, anyway._

A random turn at a street corner, and Buffy glanced up from the sidewalk to see the town’s police station. Housed in a weathered brownstone building that dated from the turn of the century, the building seemed to huddle in on itself despite being taller than the surrounding structures. That appearance of frightened bluster matched perfectly the attitudes of the policemen currently on duty inside. They were probably, on average, well-meaning men and women. People who did their best to enforce the law and protect the town’s citizens.

At least, they did so during the day. At night, unless there was clear and immediate cause to believe they were needed to deal with a specific emergency, they wisely stayed inside their headquarters. Those newbies who failed to listen to the veterans, who went out on patrol during the hours of darkness….

Well, those types seldom lasted long enough to become veterans themselves.

When Buffy looked over at Faith, she was expecting to find an expression of either nervousness or indifference. After all, the girl was guilty of any number of crimes; probably a greater number and variety than the blonde Slayer could even imagine. On the other hand, her employer almost certainly used his immense influence to shield her from anything the local police could bring against her. And so, this close to the police she should be feeling a little tension, or some casual nonchalance, or maybe a little of both, choose any of the three.

What Faith’s face showed, though, was none of the above. Contempt was what Buffy saw there, reflected in the slightly narrowed eyes, the faint sneer, the conscious, arrogant strut that took the place of her usual stride. It was typical of the girl, typical of what she had shown everyone who tried to peer beyond the façade she showed the world. Faith didn’t care about anyone except herself (and apparently, inexplicably, Mayor Wilkins), and anyone who expected something so human as compassion from the rogue Slayer was in for an unpleasant end. Humans were beneath her, and so were human considerations like mercy, or kindness, or….

Or….

Buffy sighed, and looked away from Faith’s face, back to the sidewalk before them.

_Or love. Because that’s just not in her. It can’t be! Not when she’s capable of such brutality, and betrayal, and, well, evil. You can’t have love and hate, caring and killing, all in the same package. Not and have it all be real, anyway._

They walked on, Buffy still leading the way, still holding Faith’s hand in her own. Despite herself, she couldn’t help but notice that it was a nice hand; a fair bit larger than her own comparatively tiny ones, yes, though not at all mannish or clumsy for all that. Narrow palm, long, strong fingers that wrapped gently around hers. That touch felt honest, it felt real.

It couldn’t _be_ real… and neither could the rest of it.

Faith was _not_ in love with Buffy.

No way, no how.

Her stomach got all clenched up and queasy at the mere notion.

_No. She’s trying to fool me into thinking that she cares about me, that she’s got this soft and fluffy side in her to balance out the amoral killer, and I’m not going to fall for it._ Deep breaths, in and out, like Angel had taught her as part of the Tai Chi she had tried to pick up for a while, failed to calm her speeding heartbeat. _This routine isn’t even new; Faith was pushing her hyper-sexed image at me from day one, there’s no reason to think this latest stuff means anything._

She tried hard to believe that. It didn’t work especially well.

_What else_ could _it mean? Sure, she’s smarter than I thought she was, and all of this could be some sort of trick, some twisted little game she’s playing, but what does it gain her? If she wanted me dead, she wouldn’t have needed to go through all of this to manage it. Even if she wanted to torture me first, it’s not like Wilkins couldn’t have zapped me unconscious tonight, so that his little wild-child sidekick could chain me up and drag me off for a week or two of fun with blades and fire and whatever else she could think up._

_Instead, though, she rescues me, and that makes so little sense that even saying ‘hey, she’s crazy’ doesn’t explain it. Except…._

Except for what Faith had said to her a week earlier. Even after everything, after arguing with each other, and threatening each other; after the other girl had shot Buffy twice through the leg, there had been completely, utterly confusing end to the encounter.

_She told me that even though she might have to hurt me, she would never kill me, never let anyone else kill me if she could stop it. And that’s what she did tonight; she put herself between me and the big bad, she kept him from doing the smart thing and just killing me. Then there’s the last thing she did, last week. After she gave me this knife of hers, and made me that promise, she…kissed me._

Remembering that, feeling again the rush of confusion and unease which that kiss had provoked, brought forth an unexpected and powerful response in the blonde Slayer.

Outrage.

_God, I’ll bet she_ is _playing me! Sure, she could have let Dick kill me tonight, or she could have had a few laughs while she cut me into pieces in her playroom-slash-torture chamber, but that isn’t what she’s after! No, she’s killed people before, tortured people before; that’s old hat for her now. What she wants is to ‘do’ me; add another notch to the ol’ bedpost before it’s too late, and Grad day gets here, and it’s time to take me out of the picture._

It was amazing how the wave of fury had polarized all the little random bits yet again; her realization that Faith showed all the signs of being in love with her had sent Buffy into a dazed and uncertain mental state, and now she was suddenly in a savagely-focused place, where her vision was practically red-hazed with the force of her anger.

_What did she expect me to do, after that little lip-lock? Just go ‘Yippee! I suddenly realize that I’ve always wanted to jump your bones, Faith! Let’s get busy humping each other like two crazed bunnies!’?_

Buffy’s teeth were grinding together, so loudly that she wondered if the other girl could hear it.

_Fat chance. Just because I let her get away with a little smooching --surprise smooching, by the way, not something I agreed to ahead of time-- that doesn’t mean that I’m all set to go ‘alternative lifestyle’ with her._ Especially _with her!_

Now that she had finally figured out Faith’s little game, Buffy wanted nothing more than to crush the hand she was holding, turn the bones to paste, hear the other girl cry out in surprise and pain as the Slayer bludgeoned her unconscious, dragged her to Wesley, and sent her off to whatever awaited her in England. 

_I don’t care if I promised her that it wouldn’t happen that way. What does someone like her know about promises anyway, when everything she says and does is a lie?_

Tightening her grip on Faith’s fingers, Buffy turned to look at the other girl. Her other hand curled into a fist, low at her side and ready to sweep up and into the girl’s lying mouth, the Slayer was almost snarling as she spoke.

“Did you _really_ think that I would _ever—_ “ 

…And she bit back the rest of what she was going to say, as Faith’s face registered. 

Cool, casual, seeming not at all concerned about whatever might come next… but there, peeking out from around the edges of that otherwise in penetrable mask, there was just the faintest trace of something forlorn and wistful. Something that could only be… hope. Not anticipation of a conquest, or the desire to destroy an enemy after first deceiving them. This was simpler than that, something childlike and strangely, heart wrenchingly innocent.

Which was certainly not how she would ever have dreamed of describing Faith before now.

“Think that you would ever what?” Faith asked, and Buffy had to force herself to smile, and relax, before the other girl realized what she’d been about to do.

“Um, think that I would ever… be walking down this street again. With you, I mean.” She gestured off to the side, where a pair of abandoned houses sat behind small, weed-choked yards. The police station was a couple of blocks behind them, somehow; left behind while she was lost in her thoughts. “Remember back when we’d be patrolling, and have to check out places like that for vampire lairs? Spooky stuff, even with the two of us.”

It was lame, mighty lame… and still way better than explaining what she’d actually been about to say. Faith accepted it, though, looking over at the darkened structures.

“Well, I guess we could go and have a look, if you want.” She sounded less than enthusiastic. “I thought you were taking me somewhere to have this talk…?”

Buffy nodded, still watching the subtle play of expression on the taller girl’s face.

“Yeah. I mean, yes; talking will be good.”

They weren’t walking anymore, they were standing there, facing each other, and Buffy still had hold of Faith’s hand. The dark-haired girl glanced down, relaxed her grip and wiggled her fingers just a bit before gently resuming her own hold on Buffy’s hand. She smiled then, faintly, as if she’d had to reassure herself that the contact was real. She looked happy; uncertain, but happy. It was very awkward, and very strange, and Buffy didn’t have a clue now as to what she was going to do next.

_No one,_ no one _is that good an actor,_ the Slayer thought to herself. _This isn’t some big plan for her; whatever she and the Mayor are doing, that’s the only scheme she’s got going. Whatever this is between the two of us, it’s real._ She swallowed then, past a throat suddenly tight with guilt. _At least, her half of it is real. Me, I’m trying to figure out a way to twist it around so I can get the information I need to stop them. There is a liar here after all…. And it’s me._

Faith’s left eyebrow lifted just a little, inquiringly, and Buffy realized that they had yet again been standing in silence for several long seconds.

“You know, B, I’m getting the feeling that if I leave it up to you, we’ll still be roaming the streets when the sun comes up. Did you actually have a place in mind you wanted to go, or are you just stalling?”

Buffy shrugged, looked away, and let go of Faith’s hand on the pretext of needing to brush her blonde hair back behind her shoulders.

“No, not stalling, so much as—“ _So much as not wanting to think too much about what I’m going to do to you. I see now how to trick you again, to take what you’re feeling and make you open up and tell me what I need to know. You’re in love with me, and I’m going to use that, use you… because I have to. Because it’s my job._ She felt a little dizzy, a little sick… and more than a little disgusted with herself. “—so much as basically wondering how far I should trust you.”

Faith grinned, her teeth flashing white in the darkness.

“I could say somethin’ like ‘only trust me as far as you can throw me’, only we both know that’s a little too far, huh?” She glanced around for a moment, then back at the smaller girl. “How about this? We go somewhere public, with people around, so neither of us can pull any shit without the whole town knowing about it.” She pointed down the street, to where a brightly-lit sign was visible two blocks away. “Looks like there’s still some places open; let’s get something to eat.”

“Eat? The two of us, together?” She turned back to Faith, feeling even more uncomfortable now than she had a moment before, if such a thing were possible. “No. I mean, not a good idea, really. We could, uh…. Oh. Let’s go and hang out on the swings in the park.” Buffy nodded in agreement with her own suggestion. 

_Yes, good idea. A couple hours of bonding, talking, maybe we’ll even trip over a vamp or something; if anything is guaranteed to put Faith in a good mood it’s some Slaying. By sunup we’ll be halfway back to being bestest friends again._

It was glaringly obvious now that confrontation and demands would never bring the girl back from the dark places, but where force had failed, maybe simple kindness would succeed. From the looks of things, Faith was pathetically eager for any sort of attention from Buffy. If that was all that was needed, if that would be enough to satisfy the lost, lonely girl, then it was a small enough price to pay.

_Some small talk, some Slaying, and a goodnight kiss to make her think I’m all infatuated, and maybe she’ll start thinking that being evil isn’t everything it’s cracked up to be._

Buffy nodded again.

“That’ll work, let’s go. The park is empty at night anyway, so nobody will….”

“Nobody will see us?” Faith finished for her. Hands on hips, the dark-haired girl stared down at the Slayer. “That’s what you were going to say, right? That’s why you’re not keen on the burger idea? ‘Cause look, it’s not even eleven-thirty yet, and hey, your gang might still be out, and gee, what if they were to see their hero Buffy, and that nasty-bad Faith actually sittin’ down together instead of trying to rip each other’s innards out?” She turned away then, one hand dropping to brush across her hip, as if looking for a weapon to reassure herself that she wasn’t helpless, wasn’t vulnerable. There was nothing there, though, just denim, so she ended up stuffing her hands in the pockets of her jeans. “Guess I forgot; nobody but the inner circle gets the privilege of your time, right? I suppose I should be grateful that you honored me with your attention for this long.”

The Slayer had already been feeling guilty about what she’d been doing.

Now it was worse.

_There she goes, being the self-pitying victim-girl. And being completely right about why I didn’t want to grab a late dinner with her, too, darn it. I don’t want to have to explain what I’m doing to any of the others. I couldn’t tell them about last week; it was too strange, there were too many things about what happened that I couldn’t explain. If they saw me now, playing nice with Faith after everything she’s done, well...._

_Well, then I would just have to let them know what I was doing, wouldn’t I? That a few hours of playing nice with this poor crazy girl is worth it if it stops a bloodbath._

_And that’s all it would be; playing, pretending. It’s not like this is Angel, back from hell and on our side again. She really is damaged, she doesn’t even understand that what she’s doing is wrong. So I play along now, pretend I’m feeling what she feels, and then after she helps us stop Wilkins we can find a way to put Faith back together. Giles will know someone who can do the headshrinking, and with that Watcher serum in her to knock her powers down they might even be able hold her long enough to do some good._

_God knows, if she’s bad now it will probably only be worse after I talk her into betraying her Father figure and then she finds out that it was all for nothing, that I’m not planning on spending the rest of my life as her live-in soulmate._

Even thinking about how that scene would go was painful; surprising when she considered how glad she would have been to inflict a little suffering on Faith just a week or so ago.

_That was before, though. Before she showed me something besides the tough-girl act, the wild-child killer with a great bod and no conscience._

_Before she made the mistake of trusting me again, even a little._

Faith still wasn’t looking at her, but she wasn’t walking away either. That was really all the confirmation Buffy needed that her reasoning was correct, that her plan would succeed if she kept at it long enough.

_All right, enough with the writhing in guilt, I need to focus on what I’m doing. She’s lonely, vulnerable. She’s got a new daddy in the Mayor, yeah; she still doesn’t have any friends, or… well, a love interest. She’s wanted me as both for a long time now, if I’ve finally put together all bits and pieces. Looks like if I give her what she wants from me, If I play along with the fantasy she’s built up about the two of us, I can turn the Mayor’s strongest asset into his fatal weakness._

This part of being a Slayer, the cold, tactical part, had taken Buffy a long time to grasp.

Tonight, however, was the first time it had made her feel like a cold, heartless bitch.

Faith’s back was tense as she stood there staring off across the darkened street, like she was expecting to the Slayer to put a knife between her shoulders any second now. That wasn’t going to happen, of course. The only backstabbing Buffy would be doing would be the metaphorical kind.

“It’s okay,” Buffy said softly. “We can do whatever you want; you decide.” She realized now that trying to take control of things had been a mistake. Faith didn’t like being told what to do, she didn’t like others having power over her. So starting now, Buffy would give her at least the illusion of being in complete control. 

“Really, now that I think about it, I am kind of hungry.” There was no reaction from Faith one way or the other, she just stood there, barefoot and silent. “It’s a good idea,” Buffy ventured after a moment. “The eating together thing, I mean. And I know you must not get to do that much, otherwise.”

That little offering was met with silence, then the back of Faith’s head (which was all Buffy could see at the moment) tilted slightly to one side as she considered what had just been said.

“What are you talking about?” She asked, still not turning around.

Buffy gamely pressed on, figuring that a show of compassion and understanding could only help the situation at this point.

“You know, the whole ‘bad girl on the run’ thing you’re doing; having to hide from me and the guys, avoid Wesley and the Watchers, dodge any police that the Mayor hasn’t got in his pocket…. That has to put you under a lot of pressure, and it can’t be easy, not being able to move around during the day, or do anything besides sneak around in the shadows, and the sewers, maybe a cave or something, I don’t know.”

Faith finally did turn around at that.

“You’re right about that much: you _don’t_ know.” A single long stride brought her face to face with the Slayer. “Do I look scared to you? Afraid to show my face? Do I smell like I’ve been cooped up in a sewer since that night with you and Angel?”

Resisting the urge to take a step back, Buffy met the other girl’s flashing eyes.

“No, you don’t. You must have been lying pretty low, though; hiding in places like the safe room you had in that hotel, or wherever it is that you’re actually living these days.” She shrugged. “It isn’t that big a town, Faith. If you’d been going out and doing stuff I would have seen you around; and I haven’t. Except for last week, that is.”

The girl’s lips twisted in a strangely smug little smile.

“Oh, I’ve been around. Just not anyplace you’ve bothered to look.” A pause, a flicker of thought passed through the too-old eyes in that too-young face, and then Faith turned and struck off down the street. “C’mon,” She called over her shoulder. “Follow me, and I’ll show you what I mean. Then we’ll see who needs to feel sorry for who.”

Buffy stood there, watching as the other girl headed off with a strong, purposeful stride.

_Well. Or as Faith would say; ‘Shit’. I was just trying to be sympathetic, only pretty much none of that went like I thought it would, and now I’m not even able to get started on my clever plan. Which might actually be a good thing._

She’d done a lot of things during her career as a Slayer, used dozens of different tactics to defeat her enemies. One thing she’d never, ever tried, though, was seducing someone in order to gain their trust and get them to spill the secrets needed to destroy their plans. With Faith, though, it looked to be the only thing that might possibly work.

_I just don’t know if I can do it. Not only the girl-on-girl part, because, well, I’m straight and everything, but there’s also the way she’s so…. I don’t know. Prickly? Defensive to the point of psychosis?_

She sighed, forcing down the butterflies in her stomach through sheer force of will. Holding tight to her fragile resolve, Buffy started after Faith. No matter how hard it might prove to be, she had to try. Because if she didn’t, then everything around her, including the thousands of people who thought themselves safe in their homes, might well be doomed.

Measured against that, the betrayal of one girl’s hope was a small price to pay. 

Especially since it was a hope that had never, ever had any chance of being fulfilled, right?

Buffy walked faster, trying to catch up with Faith, and tried to ignore the little fingers of uncertainty that kept plucking at her conscience.

* * * * *


	6. Chapter 6

Ten minutes later, Buffy found herself in pretty much the last place she would have expected; standing at the end of a dock in Sunnydale’s harbor. She’d been here before, of course, several times. All of her previous visits, though, had been to the area across the way; the rougher, nastier sections of the waterfront, where the big commercial ships were loaded and unloaded. This particular part, the small marina where the town’s well-to-do kept their waterborne toys, was new to her.

Standing there while one of the aforementioned toys was being stolen was something new too, and yet here she was, watching it happen.

“Faith!” Buffy’s frantic hiss was louder than she’d intended, and the Slayer looked around nervously to see if anyone had heard. Fortunately no people were visible, just rows of speedboats in all shapes and sizes, bobbing quietly in their little parking slots or whatever, maybe a dozen or so cabin cruisers scattered in among them, and for the old-school weekend water goers, a few actual sailboat-type boats. The largest of which Faith had casually leap aboard a few moments earlier, and was now busy untying from its mooring. 

“Faith!” Buffy whispered again, more urgently this time.

“What?” The girl snapped back in irritation as she finished with the rope at the front of the craft. Dumping the line into a little well that was apparently designed to hold it, she made her way towards the back end of the boat, where the other rope still held it in place against the dock.

“What do you mean, ‘what’?” The blonde Slayer called back in an urgent undertone. “Don’t steal this boat is what, you idiot!” 

Predictably, Faith didn’t even hesitate. Reaching the rear mooring, she got busy untying it also.

“Try and relax, B,” she replied as she worked. “I can’t steal this boat.”

“Darn right you can’t!” Buffy shot back. For one thing, it was huge; forty or fifty feet long, easily the largest craft in the marina. 

_I mean, sure, I know she’s done worse things than Grand Theft Sailboat; lots worse. It’s just that this is too much like that last time she and I went on a crime spree…and this is carrying the old ‘Want, take, have’ credo just a little too far._

The dark-haired girl straightened, tossing the rope aside and giving Buffy a long-suffering look.

“I’m telling you that I can’t steal this thing,” She repeated, speaking with exaggerated care. “And the reason why I can’t, is because it’s mine.”

It took the Slayer a couple of seconds to process that.

“This is yours. You own a sailboat.”

“Uh huh. Sweet, isn’t it?” God, but Faith could be insufferably smug when she tried. “Now get your ass over here.”

With that she settled herself down in the low area at the… stern? Buffy wasn’t sure about all the terms one used when describing boats. Whatever, it was the place at the back with the steering wheel. Then she looked expectantly at the Slayer, challenge gleaming in her eyes.

Moving gingerly, Buffy stepped across from the dock to the deck of the boat, and carefully headed towards where Faith was sitting.

_She has a sailboat. More than that, really, this is a serious yacht._

It had an odd feel to it, too. Everything was wood, no plastic or fiberglass anywhere, and all the metal fittings looked like brass. When she put her hand on the low rail that enclosed Faith’s piloting position, Buffy could tell just from that touch that this wasn’t something that had been haphazardly slapped together by a bunch of lazy guys in Santa Monica. Everything was smooth, and finely crafted, and solid. This boat was _old_ , and somebody had taken good care of it. She stepped over the rail, and settled down onto a sort of padded bench deal opposite where Faith was sitting.

“Ignoring the whole question of how you can possibly own this thing, do you even know how to work a sailboat?”

The girl had been leaning over and rummaging through the contents of a small storage locker that was mounted beside her. Now she sat up and raked the hair back from her face.

“No, we’ve only had the one day so far for him to show me, and that kind of thing takes a while to learn. It’s not a problem tonight, though, ‘cause we can cheat.”

She pushed a button, and a low rumble began from somewhere beneath them. A few moments later Buffy caught the distinctive scent of diesel exhaust. A couple of small, discreet-looking levers were placed within easy reach of where Faith was sitting, and when she nudged one of them forward, the boat began to edge slowly away from the dock

Sitting as she was, with her back towards the front of the thing, Buffy had to crane her head around to see where they were going.

“Careful,” She said, eyeing what looked like a very narrow gap between a small fishing boat bobbing at anchor and the massive wooden pilings that ran along the edge of another dock. “More left, Faith; you need to go more—“ The Slayer’s voice had gotten louder and higher without her realizing it, and she was halfway up, with one knee braced on the seat… as they slid neatly through the gap with plenty of room to spare. Doing her best to look unembarrassed, Buffy eased back down onto her seat. When she ventured a glance at the younger girl across from her, she found that Faith wasn’t even bothering with a dirty look in her direction; all her attention was focused on navigating the crowded harbor.

“It looked like you needed more left,” Buffy mumbled.

“Mm,” was the noncommittal reply.

After that, there was silence. Faith didn’t seem to want to talk, and the Slayer didn’t really want to distract her with idle conversation while there were still so many things around into which they could crash.

That didn’t mean she couldn’t distract herself with idle thoughts, of course.

_I wonder if she killed whoever owned this, to get it? I could get Willow to look it up for me; we could track down the owner and see if he’s still alive. Or maybe he’s a vampire, one of the Mayor’s vampires, and they either just took it away from him, or he gave it to Faith as the ultimate ‘suck up to the boss’ gift?_

The younger girl pushed the throttle the rest of the way forward, and the rumble of the engine grew more pronounced. Buffy looked around to see that they had successfully exited the mouth of Sunnydale’s admittedly small harbor, and were now headed out to sea. Even at full power, the diesel engine wasn’t exactly making the large craft jump up and skim across the waves, but they were moving along at a decent pace.

The ocean, even outside the shelter of the breakwater, was surprisingly calm, and the clear sky allowed the stars, and a thin sliver of crescent moon to shine down on what would otherwise be a vast expanse of utter blackness. Even so, Buffy found herself shivering.

_Wow, that is big. And empty, too._

“Sure would be easy to get lost out here,” She said out loud, just to interject the sound of a human voice into the mix of water swirling along the hull, the steady rumble of the engine, and the breeze blowing through the empty rigging. “I don’t suppose you know how to use all that compass and chart stuff to find your way back, do you?”

Faith just jerked one thumb back over her shoulder, indicating the shore that still filled the view behind them.

“Lights,” she said, her voice just audible over the other sounds. “You can see the town from the glow, even over the horizon.” Adjusting the position of the wheel she held by just a bit, she gave the blonde a brief look. “Plus, it’s kind of hard to lose California. If you get lost, just turn east and keep going; sooner or later you’ll find it.”

“Oh.” Buffy stared past Faith, at the blazing lights of the town. 

_I suppose it would be hard to get lost, unless we went a long way out. Hmm._

“It’s a nice boat,” She ventured, still concentrating on being nice Buffy, friendly, non-confrontational Buffy. “And where are we going, exactly?” Curious Buffy, it seemed, wasn’t so easily silenced.

All she got in response to her question was a brief glance from Faith, who then went back to staring at the dark waters ahead.

This was _not_ reassuring to the blonde Slayer, and she found her thoughts bouncing all over the place in as she tried to come up with her next move.

_What now? If I push her to tell me what this is all about, I could set her off again. The last thing we need right now is another round of arguing._ She shifted her position on the padded bench a little, slightly uneasy at the way the boat was surging slowly up and down as it headed out to sea. _I might get seasick too, and wouldn’t_ that _just be perfect? I doubt she’ll feel all careless and talkative about her boss if I’m spewing my dinner all over the place._ The thought struck her, then, that it might not be a bad idea. _Hey! I get sick, Faith gets to ‘take care’ of me, she gets all nurturing and gentle, laying me down on the seats here and wiping my forehead with a wet cloth… it could work. I tell her that I’ve always cared about her, she realizes how wonderful a place the world is, I ask her to tell me the details of this ‘Ascension’ thing--_ Buffy’s brainstorming came to a screeching halt, and she grimaced. _–I ask her that, and she smiles, waits until I close my eyes, then she clocks me in the face with the nearest heavy object and rolls me off the side of this thing and into the water where I drown._ A little shake of her head, a soft sigh, and she started over. _I have to take it slow, be subtle, start small._ Gazing speculatively at where the other girl sat across from her, she had a glimmer of an idea. _There’s room enough over there for two, if they’re friendly. Maybe I should find some reason to stand up, maybe to stretch, or look around for a minute, then just ‘happen’ to end up on her side when I sit back down? Or is that too obvious?_ She took a minute to think it over, and the more she considered the idea the worse it seemed. _Too much, too soon,_ She finally decided. _Better to wait and see where she’s taking us, and play it as I go. That way, maybe—_

“I’m wondering,” Faith suddenly said, the quiet words making Buffy jump. “—what you think about me.” 

For just an instant Buffy felt her face flush red, and was glad the dim light hid it from view.

“You wonder what I’m thinking?” She asked, her voice squeaking slightly because of the sudden lump in her throat. _God, has she guessed somehow, what I’m up to? How could she, when I’ve not even really done anything yet?_

Faith shook her head in irritation.

“No, I said ‘I wonder what you think about _me_ ’.”

Buffy, still confused by how the new topic had come out of nowhere, didn’t have a response handy.

“Why are you asking me something like that now?” She said, more to gain time to think than anything else. 

The other girl looked back at her, her features pale and mask like in the starlight reflecting from the passing ocean swells.

“You going to answer me or not?”

The blonde Slayer could only shrug.

“I think….” _Careful; careful here._ “I think you’ve had it rough. Not just here, in Sunnydale, but for your whole life. What little you’ve said about things before, with your mom, and the way you had to grow up… it makes it easier to understand how you ended up doing… certain things. The paths you took.” Buffy made her voice as soft, as understanding as she knew how. “I want you to know that it’s okay; everything will be okay. We’ll find a way through all of this, the two of us.”

She kept an earnest, open expression on her face, though it wasn’t easy.

_Wow, that was pretty good. Maybe I should have been an actress or something._

Faith had watched her as she gave the little speech, and now she tilted her head just a bit to one side as she regarded the older girl.

“So it’s okay, then? All the things I’ve done?”

The Slayer again had to pick her words carefully.

“Well, not ‘okay’ so much as… understandable. Everyone does things they know are wrong, we all deal with the mistakes we make, and the damage that we cause when we don’t stop and think about how what we do is going to affect other people.” That had come out sounding very much like a Giles lecture, and she hastily tried to bring it back to something more immediate. “I don’t think anyone should be in a hurry to judge you without trying to see the whole picture, the reasons why you are… um, the way you are.” She finished somewhat weakly.

For a seemingly endless minute or so, the only sounds were the ocean against the hull and the low, steady rumble of the engine. 

“Uh huh.” Faith finally looked away, her dark eyes flickering as she glanced up at the bare mast, then past Buffy’s head at the way ahead of them. “The Mayor keeps this boat because one of the pacts he has is with a god who lives out here; an old, old sea god that people forgot about a long time ago. Every ten years, he has to come out and give the thing an offering; so long as he makes all of the payments on time, then the god will do it’s part to make sure the Ascension happens. It’s a wicked complicated thing, you know; he’s got deals and pacts with all kinds of demons and spirits, gods; some other things I don’t even have names for.”

Buffy tried her best to keep her face still and her body motionless, but inside she was exulting.

_Yes! I tell her that I forgive her, and she starts spilling the beans!_

She couldn’t help but feel a little amazed at how quickly and easily it had happened.

_I mean, wow, I didn’t even have to cuddle with her._

“Then if I sink the boat,” Buffy murmured, so excited that she barely realized that she was speaking aloud, “It’ll make the Mayor miss his appointment and break the pact. Or at the very least it would make things harder for him to manage without us catching wind of it and stopping him.”

At which point Faith stretched her leg out enough to tap Buffy lightly on the knee with one toe, rousing her from her planning and making her look up.

“I’d rather you didn’t sink my boat, B,” She said when their gazes met. “I like it a lot, and there wouldn’t be much point in it anyway, since the boss already did the last ritual thing he needed to do out here.”

Buffy blinked, her thoughts momentarily derailed.

“He already…?”

“Yeah, a couple of weeks ago. Him, me, the offering….” She smiled placidly, as if she were recalling a picnic. “It was fun. Too bad you missed it.” While the smaller Slayer tried unsuccessfully to find her voice, Faith idly trailed her fingertips along the satin-smooth wood of the wheel she was using to guide their course. “Afterwards, on the way back in, he noticed how much I dug this, and since he won’t need it again anyway, he gave it to me.” She grinned suddenly, her face lighting up with childlike delight, as she waved a hand at the rest of the boat. “To _me!_ Can you imagine what that feels like, an ex-nobody like me getting something like this?”

Through lips numb with shock, Buffy managed to speak.

“Sounds great. Good for you.” 

Faith gave her a smile, then relaxed back into her seat and closed her eyes, only the hand she kept on the wheel giving any indication that she was still aware of her surroundings.

“It _is_ great,” She said, wriggling around a bit to get comfortable. “I’m glad you’re feeling so forgiving, on account of my rough childhood and all. I was afraid you’d freak out on me again once I told you about it, especially the offering. Or sacrifice, whatever you call it.”

Fresh sea breeze or not, there still wasn’t enough air. Buffy sat there, gulping ineffectually, trying to swallow what she couldn’t force into her lungs, all the while feeling like the boat was spinning wildly.

_I’ll kill her. Right here, right now, I’ll rip the bitch’s face right off her head and stuff it into—_

“H-human?” She licked her suddenly dry lips, trying not to stumble over the words. “This sacrifice, it was human?”

Eyes still closed, Faith shrugged carelessly.

“What if it was?” She sounded half-asleep, and completely disinterested in such a minor detail. “Damaged goods like me don’t usually give a crap about anybody else, you know. So what’s another puny human… or two, or three? Nobody’ll miss them. Plenty more where those came from.”

Buffy felt like she was being torn in half. Every instinct, every fiber of her being was urging her to smash Faith, to bludgeon her until she was broken and helpless, crying and pleading to be forgiven for what she’d done. At the same time, unless she kept playing the game, unless she made the younger girl trust her, then the Mayor’s ultimate plan would likely succeed, and the potential loss of life would be far, far higher than anything Faith herself might cause.

“I—“ She took a moment and tried to find even just a shred of composure. “I wish you didn’t have to… to get so much blood on your hands, just to earn yourself a toy. Even one as nice as this.”

Faith’s outstretched feet were near enough for the blonde Slayer to reach out and touch, if she had wanted, and the younger girl was idly tapping them against each other as she lay there beneath the stars.

“Well, you don’t know how hard it was, me growing up without anything cool. Christmas was really tough too; when I was nine mom had to hock the television, and I couldn’t even watch that show that comes on every year, with Charlie brown and snoopy messing with that lame little christmas tree.”

The older Slayer struggled to make sense of that, and failed.

“What? What does—“

“I mean, how can I be responsible for _anything_ I do, when poor little me had things so bad? No dad around to buy me things, a mom who had absolutely _no_ fashion sense, and no friends to cheer me on through every happy, cheerful, sugar-coated episode of my life?” Faith heaved a profound sigh. “I’m tellin’ you, it’s tragic in a way nobody ‘cept me could ever understand.”

Buffy sat up a little straighter, her knuckles white where she gripped the smooth-polished wood rail beside her.

_Wait a minute. She’s…._

Yes, there it was; Faith’s left eye was open just the barest fraction, watching her reaction. Buffy gave the younger girl her best glare, though her insides were still wound to the breaking point from what she’d just heard.

“You’re lying again, aren’t you?” She asked, tension and nausea reducing her normally strong voice to a thin, trembling thing. “What is this, some kind of game for you?”

Faith opened her eyes fully, and her smile went away as she regarded the other girl.

“Of _course_ I’m lying; what, do you really think me and him just came out here on a sunny day and started chucking virgins over the side? Yeah, and there was this bunch of little preschoolers too, with some puppies for desert!” 

Buffy found herself trying to simultaneously feel anger at having been strung along like that, and an enormous flood of relief that the girl had not in fact been party to some kind of mass-murder.

Well, at least not _this_ mass-murder.

“But, if not that, what—“ She unclenched her aching hands and rubbed her palms up and down her arms, trying to stay warm in the increasingly chilly night air. “You said it was an offering, right? So what else would a god want except….”

“Rocks.”

“…Rocks?” The Slayer wondered for a moment if she was still being played. “You’re telling me that the pact, the one that Wilkins has with this ancient, powerful god-thing, is to come all the way out here every ten years and bring it some rocks?”

The dark-haired girl nodded, pulling herself back upright as she did so.

“You got it.” She got properly settled behind the wheel again, then spent a moment pushing a few strands of hair back from her eyes. “It’s a sea god, B. Just look around.” A gesture indicated the endless expanse of waves surrounding them. The lights of Sunnydale were a good distance behind them now; it was starting to feel distinctly lonely with just the two of them so far from solid ground. “If he, or she, or it really wanted some human blood, don’t you think it could get it without some sorcerer to help? There’s people out here all the time for it to grab if it needed a snack.”

Buffy nodded slowly, unable to refute the logic even though she was somewhat less than comforted by the thought of some supernatural presence regarding them as a potential source of food.

“I suppose.” The tight-wound coil of tension in her middle was slowly relaxing. This, of course, made room for her curiosity to return. “What kind of rocks?”

“I don’t know; magic ones?” Faith didn’t seem too interested in that detail, preferring to scan the horizon ahead. “Some of ‘em had fossils; little bits of bone or whatever sticking halfway out of them. There was other stuff too; a bundle of wheat stalks, some feathers, a few pieces of turquoise. A lot of it came in from Colorado, or Arizona; places where an ocean spirit couldn’t reach.”

She must have realized then that she was saying too much, that any bit of information might end up being of use to the good guys, because she closed her mouth abruptly. 

She stopped the boat, too, reaching out and slapping a switch that cut the engine and left them coasting through the gentle rise and fall of the waves.

Buffy wondered what significance this spot had, if any, though she still wanted to establish one thing beyond all doubt before the next topic was raised.

“So… rocks, and feathers and wheat, but no humans, right? At all?”

Faith shook her head, rising to her feet to stand easily despite the movement of the boat beneath her.

“Nope, not a one.”

“Then why?” The blonde Slayer asked her. “Why make me believe there were, and then go off on that spiel about poor little Faith’s childhood?

“Because you’re pissing me off!” Faith shouted, leaning down so that she was practically in Buffy’s face. “All that stuff about how sorry you are that I’ve made these choices, and how you can _understand_ what I’ve done, what with my tough life and nobody to be my friend.” She was all but vibrating in place with barely-controlled fury, and the Slayer braced herself for a rain of blows that didn’t come. Instead, the girl slowly straightened, staring down at Buffy with hotly gleaming eyes.

“You are so full of bullshit, B. So sweet and forgiving all of a sudden; you really think I’m that stupid?”

Buffy put everything she had into looking innocently confused.

“Of course you’re not stupid, Faith. And no matter what you might think, I really do care about you. I do forgive you, and I want to help you. Is that so impossible to believe?”

Off balance a bit now, the girl took a step back.

“Yeah, it pretty much is.” She still radiated hostility, but at least now it didn’t border on physical violence. “And even if you do really feel that way, that’s almost be worse than if you were lyin’.”

_Huh?_ Wondered the confused Buffy. _I thought she wanted me to feel sorry for her; isn’t that what all of this has been about? Why else would she keep trying to guilt me out about how I treated her?_

“How would it be worse?” She asked aloud.

“Because the one thing I never, ever want from you is pity.” Faith crouched there before her, just out of reach. “You’re saying you really do feel sorry for me?” Buffy could only nod, and this time there was no acting involved. The girl gritted her teeth, then slammed a fist downwards into the wooden decking beneath her, so hard that the entire boat boomed like a drum. She never once looked away from the Slayer. “Save it! I don’t want it and I don’t need it!” She stood up then, took a breath, and with slow deliberation unclenched her fist. “Save the pity for yourself, Buffy. You’re the one who’s pathetic; you’re the one locked into what everyone else expects you to be.” 

Buffy looked up at her.

“It isn’t wrong to have a calling, to know you have a duty and to try your best to get it done.”

Faith shook her head, looking almost sad.

“It’s a trap. They’ve got you so wrapped up in what they want from you that you don’t even know that you’re caught, but you are. I was in there for a while too, and even if I’ve only been loose for a little while, I’ve already seen things you would never believe.”

A scowl twisted Buffy’s lips, and she forgot for a moment that she was supposed to be forgiving, and understanding, and accepting of all things Faith.

“Yeah, I’ll bet you’ve seen things. Ugly things, horrible things.”

The girl seemed to consider that.

“You think so?” A moment more of thought, and she turned away. “Hang on a sec.”

A few steps took her to the low doorway that led down into the boat, and she disappeared through it.

Buffy, alone now, could only sit and wait. The boat had long since coasted to a stop, and was now drifting wherever the waves and tide directed.

 _I think things could be going a little better,_ She thought to herself as she watched the swells rise and fall in the starlight. _The two of us aren’t exactly tearing up the sheets with our passion, are we? Not even close, actually; I haven’t had an excuse to touch her, much less make her think I’m hot for her._

It was quiet now that the engine was silent; so much so that she could easily hear Faith moving around below deck. 

_Who would have ever thought she would be so angry because I felt sorry for her? I mean, because she_ thought _I felt sorry for her._ The chill breeze picked up a bit then, and she shivered, huddling a bit lower on the bench and frowning at the direction her thoughts were taking. _No, that’s wrong, isn’t it? I might be lying to her about a lot of things, but that…. No, not that. The more I see her like this, the more I talk to her, and listen to her, the more I do feel sorry for her. Because she’s not a monster, not really. She’s just broken; damaged by things that could have happened to me too, if I’d been less lucky in where I was born, and what kind of people mom and dad were._

_Well, mom, anyway._

_And the worst part of it is, I’m starting to wonder if maybe she’s not right about how I treated her. Maybe if I had been there more, listened to her more…._

_But I didn’t. I meant to; we all meant to spend time with her, include her in more than just the Slaying. It never happened that way, though. By the time she came along we’d all been doing this for years, known each other for years, and I guess we never got over the gut feeling that she wasn’t part of the group… and never would be. So we didn’t try too hard to bring her inside. We kept telling her that she was one of us, that we thought of her as one of us._

_Every time we did that, and then didn’t follow through, she must have seen us as the hypocrites we are. Is it any wonder that after a while she stopped trying to fit in with people who obviously wanted nothing to do with her?_

Buffy shivered again, and this time it had nothing to do with the temperature. 

_I don’t want to believe that; I don’t want to think that it was something that I did, or didn’t do, that brought us to where we are now. I’m the Slayer, the hero. I fix problems, I stop villains, I don’t create them._

Except, of course, there was also Angel, who would never have been in Sunnydale if not for her, would never have lost his soul and killed so many as Angelus if not for her, or spent centuries being tortured in an other-dimensional hell… if not for her.

If Faith, too, was in some roundabout way Buffy’s own creation, then… what?

_I don’t know. I don’t even know what we’re doing out here._

At that moment, Faith climbed back onto the deck. She’d used the time below to change clothes; now she wore a pair of cutoff denim shorts, and a dark blue bikini top. Buffy felt her eyebrows rising; it wasn’t exactly threatening snow, it being a southern California climate and everything, but it was definitely on the chilly side for an outfit like that. Then she saw what Faith had in her hand, and it made the clothing subject instantly vanish from her mind.

It was a knife.

“What’s up?” She asked, as casually as she could manage.

Faith gave her an unreadable look, then walked forward along one side of the boat’s slightly raised central cabin.

“I feel like a swim,” Came the reply. “Only problem is, we’re still too close to the Hellmouth, so there’s going to be nasty things following us around on the off chance somebody gets careless.”

Buffy frowned, rising to her feet and taking extreme care with the slow, unpredictable movements of the boat.

“Then it might not be a good idea to go swimming, don’t you think?”

Faith shook her head and raised the knife.

“It’s nothing I can’t handle. When the Mayor brought me out here to help him deliver the offering, he introduced me to the watery guy. Or girl. Whatever it is. And brought along a little extra tribute, and made a little side deal, just for me.”

The Slayer’s lips had just parted to ask what that deal involved, when Faith raised her left hand and drew the tip of the knife across it. Thick crimson fluid began welling up, and she cupped her hand to contain it. Without looking, she tossed the knife underhand towards Buffy, who automatically grabbed it out of the air.

With a glance at the red-stained blade, she dropped it onto the bench where she’d been sitting.

“Can you explain to me why these deals always end up costing somebody some blood?”

The other girl extended her cupped hand out over the water.

“Because it’s a bloody world, B. If something’s worth having, you’ve gotta be willing to bleed for it.” She gave Buffy a look over one pale shoulder. “Remember I said that, okay? It’s important.” Then she slowly turned her hand, letting the blood spill out.

_“Hey, it’s me; Faith.”_ Her voice sounded strange, as if someone were running it through a sound processor with messed-up bass and treble settings. There was even some reverb thrown in for good measure too; the words seemed to echo back from the empty ocean in every direction. _“Grant me safe passage in your realm, as was agreed. Please.”_

That last bit surprised a small smile from the watching Slayer.

_I guess it takes a god to get even that much politeness out of her._

Buffy leaned far enough over the rail to see where the girl’s blood was landing, and was taken aback to see that the small patch of ocean right there was burning. Literally, small tongues of fire were leaping upwards as if from some burning pool of gasoline. Every ruby drop of Faith’s blood that struck made it flare up a little more, and for a moment the Slayer was worried that the wooden hull of the boat might catch fire.

No sooner had she framed the thought, though, than the flames were abruptly gone. They had not been extinguished, however, so much as they’d been sucked down through the water’s surface and into the depths. Looking down through the dark waves, she could still see them flickering far below for several seconds… and then they flared into a circular wave front that raced off in every direction. A moment later there was an explosion of spray from several hundred yards behind the boat. Buffy’s head whipped around and she caught the barest glimpse of something large and misshapen, with a body like a malformed whale onto which had been grafted hundreds of long tentacles. It quickly vanished, and she had the impression that it was retreating at maximum speed. Several smaller splashes from various quarters also registered, but she wasn’t able to see what they were. So long as they were all leaving, she supposed it didn’t really matter.

Faith, in the meantime, had clenched her hand to staunch the flow of blood from her cut palm. 

“Should be safe enough, now,” She murmured. With a graceful movement, she bent her knees and then leapt up and out, covering more than twenty feet before arcing down to enter the water in a beautiful swan dive.

Buffy, alone on the yacht, was at a loss.

_What now? Is she going to swim back and leave me out here to starve to death?_

Just below where she stood, Faith’s head broke the surface.

“Well?” The girl demanded, staring upwards. “Get your ass in here!”

“Um….” Was Buffy’s brilliant reply. 

_Drat; some skinny-dipping would have been a good seduction ploy, but she actually went out of her way to put on something that she could swim in and still be modest enough not to freak me out. If I shuck my clothes now, she’ll wonder what’s going on for sure… and she’s already suspicious of me, because I was laying the pity on too thick before._

“It looks kind of cold,” She finally managed. “How about we just talk some more?”

Faith was having none of it.

“You’re the one who said I never got out, that I never got to go anywhere or do anything. That my life was full of stuff that was ugly and horrible, remember?”

Buffy nodded reluctantly.

“I suppose I did say that.”

The swimming girl slapped the surface of the water, sending a splash far enough to wet the Slayer’s shoes.

“Well, my answer to that is out here in the water. Come and take a look.” Then, anticipating Buffy’s next excuse: “There’s something for you to wear down in the cabin; go and put it on, I’ll wait.”

That didn’t leave her much choice; if it was important enough to drag the two of them several miles out into the Pacific ocean, she might as well go the last few yards and take a look.

Besides, that curiosity was still there, as eager as ever.

_What does she want me to see, that she thinks will impress me so much?_

The adolescent-level answer wasn’t likely, either; if Faith had wanted to show her something anatomical, then there wouldn’t have been any need for cutoff jeans and a bikini top, she would have shucked down to bare skin in an instant.

Turning away, she navigated the slowly surging deck until she reached the short set of stairs that led one down through the low doorway. She went slowly, careful not to bump her head on an unseen obstruction.

_Though if Faith can move around down here, I sure shouldn’t have any trouble._

The cabin turned out to be a gorgeous place of dark, gleaming woodwork, with light coming from delicate-looking fixtures of brass and glass. It was immediately obvious that the previous owner had _not_ been a teenage girl from Boston; the general look of the place indicated someone with a very mature taste, from the leather-bound books on the shelves (shelves equipped with little railings, to keep the volumes in place despite the boat’s movements) to the subdued elegance of the intricately-woven rug that covered the floor.

Despite that, and regardless of the brief time that had passed since Faith had taken over ownership, there 

were signs aplenty of the girl’s presence. A small pile of boxes from Sunnydale’s most expensive stores sat in one corner, and upon investigation turned out to be full of brand new clothes, all of them with the tags still in place. A large cardboard box (with the word ‘Sony’ stenciled across it) sat against the wall, filled to overflowing with what appeared to be the former occupants of the shelves above it; shelves now home to a compact, very expensive-looking sound system. Several dozen CD’s were strewn about on the floor nearby, along with bits of shredded shrink wrap.

Also present, lying in plain sight across the back of a comfortable-looking chair, was the swimsuit Faith had left for her. Picking it up and examining it, Buffy was once again surprised at how conservative the other girl was proving to be. Far from being the floss-and-postage-stamp arrangement she’d been half-expecting, it was a quite modest one-piece in black, with some shimmery blue abstract patterns stitched across it for decoration. 

_What’s up with her?_ The Slayer wondered, and not for the first time that evening. _Is the Mayor rubbing off on her, with all this maturity and old-fashioned etiquette, or is she purposely trying to tone herself down around me?_

There was nothing at all objectionable about the outfit, but she hesitated before starting to change. With the minute or two she had all alone in the cabin, it would be a shame not to do a little quick snooping. Opening drawers and cabinet doors in the main room revealed nothing of interest, so she moved further forward. A narrow hallway provided access to several more rooms, though everything was built to a smaller scale than she’d expected, to squeeze into the limited space available.

Through the first low doorway she found the tiny kitchen, complete with a stove, sink and mini-fridge. The cabinets here held a good supply of potato chips, popcorn, and what seemed like at least one box each of every single flavor of Pop-Tart imaginable. The fridge, unsurprisingly, held mostly alcohol; a half-dozen bottles of beer, two larger ones of vodka, and a nearly empty one of Tequila.

The Slayer wrinkled her nose in disgust.

_Blech. Just the smell of beer bothers me, never mind drinking it. And this other stuff… what’s Faith thinking? She’s a Slayer; her life depends on her reflexes being sharp. If she has to fight while she’s half drunk, she’s liable to end up getting killed by—_

That thought had a nasty conclusion. Nasty… but also true.

_\--She’s liable to end up getting killed by me, isn’t she? Or Giles, or Xander, or Willow._

Pushing that to the back of her mind, she moved on. The rest of the boat seemed to be what one would expect; equipment storage, a space under the floor that was all but filled with the engine, little nooks and crannies that held various uninteresting bits and pieces of rope, sail, tools, life vests.… 

And then, last of all, there was the bedroom. 

Buffy stepped inside cautiously, and for the first time she felt uncertain about what she was doing.

_I probably shouldn’t be in here. Faith would be pissed to the Nth degree if she found me in here…._

She considered leaving, but the temptation was too great. 

_Just a quick look around, is all. I want to know how she’s living, what her new life is like._

The irony of it all wasn’t lost on her; she had never been interested in the little details of Faith’s life before, when she’d been living in a squalid motel room. Now, though, the smallest things were endlessly fascinating. 

The denim jacket, for instance, hanging from a peg, ripped and torn as if by hundreds of small razors and crusted in long-dried blood. Buffy remembered that jacket; Faith had worn it while patrolling many times. What had happened to leave it like this? What had the girl fought that had drawn so much of her blood?

A photograph was pinned to the wall with a thumbtack, next to a small porthole. Who was the young woman with the long blonde hair and dark blue eyes? She was beautiful, whoever she was, despite the way her smile revealed just the barest hint of delicate fangs. More than a little disturbed, Buffy moved on.

There was a pile of unwashed clothing heaped in the corner, one black and silver running shoe peeking out from underneath. A little table held several magazines dedicated to archery and martial arts, and, oddly, copies of the Sunnydale High yearbooks from Buffy’s sophomore and junior years. 

The bed itself was unmade (of course), and lying on one corner, near at hand for anyone sleeping there, was a small handgun and a long knife. A half-empty pack of cigarettes, with the accompanying lighter and ashtray were concealed at the back of another shelf, hidden from casual view by a jumble of coral and a large conch shell.

Buffy frowned as she replaced the shell.

_Don’t want Mr. Clean-freak Wilkins to know you’ve got such a filthy habit, huh? As blackmail material goes it’s pretty weak, but anything that might drive a wedge between the two of you…._ The half-hearted thought trailed off to nothing, and the Slayer sank down to sit on the edge of the bed.

_This is… I don’t know what this is, all of this. All I know is, it isn’t what I was expecting._ Across the small room from her, another of those black trunks sat against the wall. No doubt this one, like the one she’d seen in the bolt-hole hotel room downtown, held money, fake ID’s, and other items essential for a modern villainess. The trunk itself, however, was partially-hidden by the oversized Mickey Mouse sweatshirt that had been carelessly thrown across it.

_I almost wish I wasn’t seeing all of this. It would be easier, doing what I have to do, if I didn’t…._

There was a sudden _–Thump—_ which made her jump, and the entire boat rocked slightly. For a moment Buffy wondered if maybe, somehow, the sailboat had struck a rock or something, but then she realized what it had been.

_Faith, kicking the side, telling me to hurry up._

She stood up, took a moment to straighten the covers where she’d been sitting so as not to leave any trace of her presence, and then headed back to the main cabin to change.

* * * * *


End file.
